Spanish King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia will visit the north African enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla on October 13th and 14th, more than two months after a migrant rush to Ceuta, the palace said Thursday.
Ceuta has been embroiled in a humanitarian crisis since more than 70,000 migrants streamed into the small city in an unprecedented surge on July 30th-31st that left scores dead.
Most of the migrants returned in the following hours, but thousands have remained for weeks in often dire conditions, sleeping rough in the streets or on the beach.
The stagnant crisis has angered locals who accuse the government of abandoning them, leading to regular protests.
Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez last month urged Felipe to visit Ceuta in rare public comments on royal matters, saying the city needed to feel "supported by the state more than ever".
However, when Felipe's parents King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofía visited Ceuta and Melilla in 2007 - the first official visit by a Spanish monarch since King Alfonso XIII in 1927 - it caused a diplomatic spat with Morocco.
Moroccan King Mohammed VI called their visit an insult to the patriotic feelings of Moroccans towards Ceuta and Melilla.
The Moroccan ambassador to Spain was recalled and there were widespread protests on the Moroccan side of each autonomous city's borders.
Nevertheless, the palace said "this visit has been agreed by the government and the royal household", specifying that Felipe and Letizia would travel to Ceuta on October 13th and to Melilla on the following day.
The territories mark the European Union's only land borders with Africa, and the migrant crisis sparked infighting among the bloc as a group led by Italy lambasted Spain for allowing the surge to happen.
On Tuesday, Felipe told a gala dinner in Madrid attended by visiting French President Emmanuel Macron that the EU must be "more efficient and show more solidarity in the protection of the union's external border".
The stagnant crisis has eroded Socialist premier Sánchez's standing before a general election next year, with the opposition accusing him of subservience to Rabat.
The government insists it must respect international law by assessing whether the migrants are entitled to asylum, while hundreds of unaccompanied children cannot be summarily deported.
The forthcoming visit also comes at a particularly sensitive time for Spain's historically delicate relations with Morocco as rumours swirl over the potential role Rabat played in the surge.
The Spanish right has accused Morocco of orchestrating the surge for political motives, which Rabat has denied. Sánchez has said no "solid proof" exists to prove that theory.
With additional reporting by The Local Spain's Editor Alex Dunham
Comments