The tears of the immigrant child who uses plastic bottles as floats

A young man, looking like a miner, swims in the waters of El Tarajal beach in Ceuta. Spain. She has several plastic bottles of mineral water and soft drinks strapped to her swimsuit, an amazing system to help you stay afloat on your swimming trip from the Moroccan coast. Pictures show him exhausted and distraught reaching shore.

He is one of hundreds of young people who have tried to reach Spain since Monday. Among them, around 740 children and adolescents have been registered. Frustrated, he starts to cry and implores the soldier in front of him to let him pass. This tells you that he has no intention of harming you.

Moments later, the immigrant throws the bottles and begins a race to try to climb the stone wall on the beach, before being hit by members of the local army. The images do not show any identification. The soldiers try to comfort him by accompanying him to the edge of the fence.

The teenager resists at first, but gives in to the inability to find a place to escape. Once there, they open the door for him to leave Spain again. According to Spain’s Interior Ministry, thousands of immigrants have been “turned back at the border”, while hundreds more have returned voluntarily.

About two-thirds of the estimated 8,000 immigrants who arrived, which Spanish authorities said included unaccompanied children as young as seven, have been deported. Many of those who were sent back were determined to return to Ceuta and, during those hours, they would try again.

And while most of the adults who entered in recent days have either been sent back to Morocco or left on their own, unaccompanied minors are not permitted by law to be returned. Children are crammed into tents that serve as shelters and others roam the streets.

Most of the minors who wish to go into exile come from poor familiesThey don’t go to school and sometimes do odd jobs to survive.

This “impressive” flow of children at the Spanish border is unprecedented according to Omar Naji, a Moroccan human rights activist who follows the issue of migration.

“His deportation by Spain is contrary to international treaties on children’s rights,” he said indignantly. “The Moroccan authorities have involved them to put pressure on Spain for political ends,” he condemns at the same time.

The situation has been further aggravated by the crisis linked to the Covid-19 pandemic. Two in five young people living in urban centers were unemployed, according to official figures for 2020.