 [France24] Families arrested at home in the middle of the night, herded into buses and then abandoned to their fate in towns in the middle of the desert — since June 17, members of the sub-Saharan African community living in Morocco have been contacting our team, frightened by the wave of arrests targeting migrants in Laayoune, a town known as a departure point for people hoping to reach Spain’s Canary Islands.
Koffi (not his real name) is from the Ivory Coast. He lives in a neighbourhood called 25 mars (or March 25) in Laayoune, Morocco. The area is known as a gathering point for migrants hoping to reach Spain’s Canary Islands by crossing the Atlantic Ocean. Koffi says the recent wave of arrests has been particularly violent:
The police arrive in the middle of the night, often around 5am, when everyone is still sleeping. They knock two or three times and if the person doesn’t answer, then they break down the door and make everyone come out, including the women and children. Some people are willing to take great risks to escape the police. A friend broke his arm jumping out of the window.
Most of the people targeted in these raids are from the Ivory Coast,
Cameroon,
Mali
or Togo.
A video circulated online showing one man in a hospital room, his arm in a cast, explaining how he hurt himself jumping from the third floor in an attempt to get away from the police in early June.
|