- On the contrary, Gran Canaria and Tenerife experienced increases of 164 and 512 percent respectively
- The delegate attributes the general decrease to police efficiency and greater cooperation shown by Morocco
ACN
The efficiency of the State security forces and greater cooperation with Morocco have been the keys pointed out this Monday by the Government Delegate in the Canary Islands, José Segura, to explain the reduction by half (4,751) of the arrival of immigrants to the Islands during 2005, compared to the previous year.
This decrease is mainly motivated by the reduction during 2005 by 234 percent of the arrival of immigrants to the island of Fuerteventura, which brought together practically the bulk of the immigration that arrived in the Canary Islands in 2004, when 7,532 of the 8,519 immigrants who arrived throughout the year to all the Islands arrived on the island. In the past year, this number was reduced to reflect an arrival of 2,249 undocumented immigrants to the island of Majorera.
However, the notable increases registered in Gran Canaria and Tenerife stand out (164 and 512 percent respectively), which meant that in 2005 1,416 and 637 immigrants arrived respectively, perhaps motivated by the need for the mafias to vary the common routes given the effectiveness of the interception in Fuerteventura.
For its part, it is also worth noting the stabilization of the situation in Lanzarote, where 329 immigrants arrived in 2005, 19 less than in 2004, and the arrival of 72 and 48 immigrants respectively to the Islands of La Gomera and La Palma, islands where not a single immigrant arrived during 2004.
Regarding the origin of the immigrants who reach the Canary coasts, the vast majority still belong to Mali, Gambia and Morocco, in that order, although decreases are recorded in all cases. Thus, in 2004, 1,654 immigrants arrived from Gambia and in 2005 the number was reduced to 1,228; 2,830 arrived from Mali in 2004 and the number was reduced to 1,299 in 2005 and 902 undocumented immigrants arrived from Morocco in 2004, a number that rose to 784 in 2005.
Finally, as of today, the Immigrant Internment Centers of Las Palmas, Fuerteventura and Santa Cruz de Tenerife have a total of 1,186 internees, 107, 871 and 208 respectively.
Police efficiency
The Government Delegate attributed this reduction to almost half in the number of immigrants who arrived during 2005 to the Islands to the efficiency of the State Security Forces and Corps and to greater international cooperation, expressly that shown by Morocco, a country that he said "is cooperating much better than in other times".
However, Segura pointed out that "no matter how many means Spain puts in place", it will not be able to "cut the problem of immigration at the root", since he pointed out that this is a human drama that depends on "many parameters of other countries", mainly hunger and war.
