Thousands of children remain stranded in Ceuta

0:03Hello and welcome to NewsHour from the World Service of the BBC coming live from London. This is Owen Bennett-Jones. You may remember that just over a week ago, some 70 ,000 people burst into the Spanish exclave of Ceuta, which is located on the North African coast inside Morocco. And many of them actually left Ceuta of their own accord quite soon after arriving. Reports suggested that they quickly found themselves short of food and water and just decided to go back home. but some people stayed behind and a fair number of those are unaccompanied children. Well Maria Jimenez is based in Ceuta where she volunteers for Association Eilin which works with migrants there.

0:49How many Moroccan children are there in Ceuta now? We don't have official figures from the governments but through the accounts carried out by the residents in the outlying neighbourhoods We know that there are more than 4 ,500 unaccompanied minors on the streets, mainly Moroccan, but also from other origins. Right. It seems a very, very high number, and quite surprising that they don't want to get back home to their families. Do they want to get back home? Most of them don't want to go back home. The situation, especially in the north of Morocco, is very complicated. they are aware of the fact that they might struggle studying, finding a job, and most of them just want to have a hope for a better life.

1:41And that's the main reason why they want to come here to Spain or to other European countries. And when we say children, does that mean many of them are like 17, 16, 17, sort of older children? No, and even younger, we can see children that are maybe 10, 12, 13, and others who are a bit older, between 15, 17. Ten-year-olds are coming in and saying, Yes. I don't want to be with my family, I want to be in Spain. Yes. That seems incredible. So what sort of situation are they in now, those children? The situation really is devastating. So some very precarious and insufficient facilities have been activated in the last couple of days.

2:33So a few open-air school playgrounds are being used to house mainly women and girls, but not the rest of the children who remain across the city. So we estimate that maybe around 300, 400 girls and women are now in those schools. But no other facilities have been activated so that they are able to stay somewhere that is more or less safe. So most of them are in the streets, sleeping in the streets, waiting for the government to find a solution to find at least to open some facilities so they can sleep somewhere else. Now, you were born in Ceuta, right? You're Spanish born in Ceuta. So when you talk to your friends and neighbours, what do they think about this?

3:26I mean, are they feeding these children or are they leaving them in the street? What attitude do they take? Well, there are all sorts of responses. So some residents have shown solidarity distributing food, water, blankets, clothing, especially in some outlying neighbourhoods. But these residents are completely overwhelmed because many people have been gathering in those areas and they just don't have the human and the material resources to respond to this situation. And there are also residents in the city who have shown fear, confusion and anger as well, especially in the early days, which is completely understandable because, just to give you an idea, Ceuta is about 20 square kilometers and has around 80 ,000 inhabitants.

4:20and in the first few dates, the official figures we have is that around 70 ,000 people entered the city. And if you see the city in a map, it's not in the Spanish mainland. It resembles an island. Geographically, it's like an island, so it's really a situation that's suffocating. Let me just put to you how some people around the world may see this situation. They may say that Soweto is basically a colonial outpost that has been there since the 1500s. There's no reason for Spain to have territory in Africa. And that the consequence is that if the borders were opened, millions of people would come and try and get access to Spain.

5:04And it's just a historical anomaly which leads to this situation. I mean, you're born and bred there. What would you say to people who think like that? First of all, I think there is some confusion here. Ceuta, this city, is not a former colonial territory. It has always belonged to Spain, and before belonging to Spain, it belonged to Portugal. So it's not a territory where Europeans arrived, conquered the space, like it happens in many other territories in Africa. and those territories have been decolonized. That's not what's in the case of Ceuta. It has always been a Spanish city. And, well, of course, I mean, we completely understand the fear, the confusion and the anger facing this situation, especially, specifically from our organization, what we call for is for safe routes to migrate, especially issuing visas for people who are willing to come here.

6:11So visas for people who are fleeing from conflict, visas for people who might be willing to study and work in Spain or in any other European countries. And this is not the ideal situation for anyone, for people who migrate and for people in Ceuta or generally in Spain. And that's Maria Jimenez there who is based in Ceuta where she works with refugees and people who've come in. Well, René Pascalion is a Dutch journalist who covers Morocco and Spain for various European newspapers, freelance journalists. And she's currently in the Canary Islands in Spain where she's actually based. Now, the Moroccan king has spoken about all this and said these children should be returned.

6:58But as she explained, it's not quite as simple as that. Spain can't just send them back. Under the European Convention, as well as under Spanish national law, children have the right to a procedure so they cannot be collectively exposed. And most of the time, the majority of these children are allowed to stay because most of the time it's in the interest of the child to stay in the country where they migrated to. Right. So adults can be sent back and children can't? yeah officially adults have also must also have a procedure though we see in reality this does not always happen like like we saw in in sota children must have the right to to have a procedure at least and are you uh clear on why these children ended up there unaccompanied i mean it seems incredible so so did they go alone or did they go with their families and then their families left them there?

7:53How did it work? No, these children, they went alone. So we see like 14 year olds, 15 year olds children, they went alone there. And it says a lot about the economical situation in Morocco being very dire that even children as young as 14 want to leave their country without their family. And do the families encourage them, do you know? I've spoken to many unaccompanied minors arriving on the Canary Islands where I live, And it depends. Most of the time, they don't discuss these issues with their families. They just leave without telling them. Right. And is there any contact between the children and their families?

8:33Are they getting money from their families? How does that work? Yeah, they speak with their families. I've heard some families, they try to arrange for money to be sent to these children. I spoke, for example, to a brother of a boy, but he's 20 years old, so he's not a minor. but it's very difficult for families now to help these children or these young people from Morocco because for example they don't have a passport so they cannot collect money from the bank practical issues like these yeah it's interesting you said that the decision is basically what's in the best interest of the child because you know you could see two two versions of that the best interest is to get to Spain and make a life there but the best interest that yeah we're hearing as young as 10 would be to be with their family wouldn't it so so it's I mean that must be a difficult decision that must be a very difficult decision and i must admit that i don't know in reality if if a child is better off in morocco or is better off in spain what i can say though is that like unaccompanied minors have had a very hard time in in spain um especially for example so the situation right now is septa we we could draw a comparison what happened in the canary islands so it was at a much lower level but in the canary islands they also had 6 000 miners in in the in the region and the system was completely collapsed so the the children that they were staying in in centers there was a lot of news that there or reports that they were actually abused in the centers there was a lot of mistreatment physical abuse mental abuse in the next weeks, we can see a similar situation evolving about unaccompanied miners in Soita that we saw in the Canary Islands.

10:19So does that mean in Morocco, you know, most opinion, if you can gauge what most people would think, would they be thinking, oh, good luck to these boys and girls, let's hope they make it to Spain, or would they be thinking, we must get these boys and girls back? the question is more surrounded at how difficult the situation is in Morocco right now so I think that a lot of people they empathize with uh with these boys and they understand their decision to leave because the economical situation is very difficult in Morocco for many of them their situation at home is is absolutely uh difficult very difficult and just to clarify just I think this is what you're saying but just to clarify if an if an adult was in Ceuta they'd have to prove they were suffering political persecution or some kind of persecution and therefore get refugee status.

11:08But for children, it's different. And it's just what's in the best interest of the child. Exactly. Yeah. So there must be determined if it's the best interest of the child for the child to save. So now it's interesting to see that the Moroccan, the royal instructions, so that's coming from the kingdom, has said that they want to cooperate with Spain to return the children. But that must be extremely hard because that requires, legally it requires cooperation of the families in Morocco, which is most of the times is very difficult to get in touch with those families, to have this clear that they will take them back, that their situation will be well.

11:44And of course, also just the huge number to register all of them and to carry out all these proceedings. And also important to note that while all these procedures are carried out, which could take months or even longer, the child already has a right to education, to health care, to a stable living condition inside the center. But of course, in practice, this is going to be super complicated because the guardianship is under the autonomous region, or in this case, the autonomous city of Sota. So Sota right now is responsible for these children, but the law indicates that once they surpass a certain quota, which in Sota is only 27 children they can receive, they must be redistributed to mainland Spain in two weeks.

12:31But that's the law. But in reality, this is very difficult because the autonomous regions, the populist folks party in the autonomous regions, they are obstructing this. So in practice, this redistribution has a lot of challenges. And that was René Boscalian, freelance journalist who's covering these issues in both Morocco and Spain. You're listening to the World Service.

12:58Many people around the world think of Thailand as a place where you basically lie on a beach in the sun in a very relaxed environment. And of course, there's a lot more to it than that. but it's a bit of a surprise to learn that the country actually has the second highest level of gun ownership in Asia. Might that change after a school shooting in which a 14-year-old boy killed eight before taking his own life? Well, the Thai government is now talking about new rules restricting ownership. Dr. Bunwara Samano is a research fellow with the Thailand Development Research Institute in Bangkok. So why is gun ownership so high in Thailand?

13:37I think because of two main reasons. One is about weak rule of law in Thailand that makes people feel insecure and therefore feel the need to have a weapon to protect their life and their loved ones. Another reason would be the illegal guns. Among 10 million guns in Thailand, 40 % of them are illegal guns or unregistered ones. And these could be the guns that either smuggled through the borders, because Thailand has long borders with neighbouring countries that might have ongoing conflicts, or guns that are homemade, and therefore they were not sold in the official market. I mean, I take the point that, you know, a significant number you're saying are illegal, but a lot of these guns are legal.

14:42So the government basically issues licenses for a lot of guns. Yes. And a lot of the registered guns are also unused guns because they belong to those people who either retired from the police or military force or just the civil service because they can also get access to guns. So just talk us through this. Civil servants get guns. I mean, that seems strange. And who else can get guns easily? That also includes state-owned enterprises, unfortunately, because in Thailand there's a gun welfare scheme that allows civil servants, including those who work in state-owned enterprises, to buy guns at a cheaper rate than the market.

15:34The reason given is for these civil servants to carry their duty and protect their life. This also goes back to my first statement about the lack of trust in the police force to ensure the life and property of people will be protected. If you remember a few years ago, there was a big scandal within the National Police Force. The deputy national police chief was found to have more than 200 guns in his possession. He was accused of mishandling this gun welfare scheme, basically. So we need more concrete response to this gun violence in Thailand than what the government is doing right now. OK, but the government is saying it's going to introduce restrictions on gun ownership.

16:40You don't think that will work? Putting more restriction on gun ownership by limiting the number of permit issuance will only address the number of guns that are the legal ones. Without increasing the level of security, people in the society will still try to get weapons in their hands. And that was Bunwara Samano, who is a research fellow with the Thailand Development Research Institute.

17:18As you may have heard over the last week, the 41-year-old black sociology professor in Cambridge, Jason Ardy, resigned his post after being accused of plagiarism, which he denies. There is an associated problem that he's apparently made a number of claims about his life, which he has subsequently changed. You might have thought that the resignation would put an end to his story in the media, but there is another aspect to it. Simon & Schuster, the publishers, are planning to bring out his memoir, Great and Unfortunate Things, as soon as next week. And there are reports they paid a lot of money for it.

17:56And they now have to work out what to do. Scott Sinclair owns a PR company Deep South Media in Bournemouth, the UK Do you think Simon & Schuster should publish it? Yes I think that it's about taking a measured view Yes, there are arguments both ways about whether these allegations to do with plagiarism and misrepresentation are true He has denied them as you said in your introduction We are in the court of public opinion, but I think, you know, just as many politicians and commentators may kind of over egg the pudding and caveat later. You know, I think there's sufficient nuance here. I think there's sufficient gray area that I would say to them, do your fact checks, of course, but publish.

18:50Expect a lot of scrutiny. Expect criticism. but I think on balance, publish, yes. Because that would make more money. Is that what you're thinking? It's bound to be a good seller there. Well, indeed, there is a commercial imperative here, but I think even if that wasn't the case, I think my advice would be that there is sufficient room for manoeuvre here to allow it to go ahead. I mean, this is, by all accounts, the story of an extraordinary person, an atypical person who's overcome lots of challenges to become the youngest black professor in Cambridge University's history. It's a story of overcoming challenges and maybe very inspiring for a lot of people.

19:33And I think on balance, I would advise them to publish. Well, here's a counter-argument. He has said that he didn't speak until he was 11. He didn't read or write until he was 18. Now, some of the other things he's said, like that he did a marathon, six marathons in six days, he's subsequently changed. He said, no, actually it wasn't six, it was 12. So there's a question of how much you can believe, isn't it? Well, I agree with you. I'm not a spokesperson for him, but I think if I was advising the publishers, I think it's about how you present it. And if this is a subjective recollection of what has happened, then there is that kind of room for manoeuvre.

20:20so it's not necessarily an objective fact to the kind of a set of circumstances it's a recollection of someone's life and an extraordinary life I mean Simon Schuster must worry I mean there is a precedent isn't there back in 2006 Random House had to pay out a lot of money to readers who said they'd been defrauded when a memoir came out that just wasn't true and they had to pay the people who bought the book back um well again i think it depends how it's marketed um you know if it's marketed as a subjective set of recollections i think there's some latitude there and so as i say on balance my advice would be publish expect the scrutiny um expect there'll be some kickback but uh be bold and go for it but if it's already i mean people saying release next week that means they can't change the text at all, presumably.

21:11That must be ready to go. Well, there may well be some conversations going on in the publisher's communications department about how best to present it. But you're right. If it's going to be published next week, then we can assume that it's printed, it's in distribution hubs around the globe, and it's ready to go. And therefore it is too late, and that commercial driver will see it out there. It sounds like you're going to buy a copy, I think, aren't you? I think it'd be very interesting absolutely yes thanks very much uh that was uh scott sinclair they're talking about that memoir that may or may not be coming out next week

21:58welcome back to news hour over the last few decades cheap flights and package holidays have fueled a boom in mass tourism and the world bank actually estimates now it's incredible that one in ten jobs around the world is supported by travel and tourism. But that has meant increased pollution and waste, and in some areas upset residents talk about being overwhelmed with visitors. So can tourism have a more positive impact? The BBC's Adrian Murray got on her bike to find out about one idea in the Danish capital Copenhagen. More tourists are choosing this green way of getting around. but as a local resident I can tell you many of them struggle with the busy cycle lanes and it can cause us commuters a lot of frustration.

22:47To help the city is holding cycling safety workshops and offering a free bike rental session for visitors who take part. Don't forget to look over your door. Oh okay, got it. So otherwise you're blindly going into a corner right? There might be somebody coming. Yeah, okay, thank you. The sessions are part of a city-wide scheme called Copenpay, which essentially rewards tourists for good behaviour. Visitors can earn perks like a free drink or a museum tour by doing some volunteering or travelling around by bike or public transport. Rika Holm-Peterson from the local tourist board says the scheme has encouraged tourists to move around sustainably.

23:28We've been running Copenpay for two years now and we've seen bike rental increase of 59%, which is huge. And for sure, we need to make sure that people are safe. So it really become a great experience, both for the visitors and the locals. I got chatting to a few of my fellow cyclists to see what they thought, starting with Bo, who was visiting from New Jersey. I stumbled across it online. It didn't occur to me that we could do this in Copenhagen, but now that I'm doing it, I'm definitely going to rent a bike and see the city that way. you cover a lot more ground and it's great. I'm Shefali Sajteva.

24:03I belong to India. Do you think it's a good approach that Copenhagen, the colour of rewarding tourists for doing positive things? Absolutely. It is a great thing. I mean, you know, rather than restricting places for tourists, which, you know, some of the cities do. The Copenhagen scheme started in 2024 with 24 local partners. It's now expanded to more than 100 partners and they range from cafes and restaurants to museums and even a ski slope. Another partner that's been involved since the beginning is GoBoat, a Danish company that rents out battery-powered boats on Copenhagen's canals. I met up with GoBoat co-founder Kasper Eich Rommer to try out their activity.

24:49The good deed in Copenhagen is to come out, help us clean up the waters and the reward is to get a boat ride in return. Rieke from Copenhagen's tourist board says that since Copenhagen was launched two years ago, 100 other tourist destinations have been in touch to find out how it works. Last month, Germany's capital ran a pilot called Berlin Pay. We cannot save the world here in Copenhagen, but imagine if we next year see 40 cities having implemented this. Then we sort of started a global movement. Well indeed and that was Rika Holm-Petterson there ending that report from Adrian Murray.

25:51Well, at the same time as these reports, Donald Trump put out a truth social post of an image of him looking down over a town in Greenland with the script Hello Greenland. Well, Greenland actually stopped issuing new oil licences back in 2021 on environmental grounds. Executives say this is from the company, the drilling company, one trillion dollars of crude oil could be beneath the ground. Well, let's get a take on this from Sasha Faxer. She's a former Danish MP, a public voice in Denmark on Greenland and defence and foreign politics more generally. So what do you make of this? I mean, they're not drilling.

26:29They're just sending over the equipment. Does that matter? Yeah. So this is actually kind of a complicated and to another way also a simple matter, because it matters when you ship in 300 containers of equipment to one of the most remote, vulnerable environmental areas in the world. The ecosystem is very fragile. You have to imagine it's where the muscus ox live, the polar bear and other endangered species. So when you ship it in and say you're going to drill, it has an impact. So there are actually old licenses to drill. That goes before the 21 you spoke about, and that's what they are actually leaning up against.

27:12But to put in the equipment, you need a permission to sail in the gear, which they don't have. So they don't have the permission to get in the gear. And that's the whole issue right now, because to get such a permission, they file for permission back in May this year. but usually you wouldn't need to make an assessment both for societal impacts but also environmental impacts and such an assessment would take about two years. So it's not there for them to put it in yet. So that's the huge issue. And put on top of that the whole, you already mentioned Trump, but the whole tension between the Kingdom of Denmark, Greenland and the US.

27:55So it's a very blurry situation. That's a very helpful explanation to understand what's happening. Does that mean that Denmark, if it wants to defend Greenland's sovereignty, really, would need to block the arrival of these 300 containers? So there has already now illegally come in a number of containers that came in on July 29th. So the Greenlandic government is now trying to look into how can, what kind of ramifications can that have? They have not discussed yet what they want to do about it, but it's actually done against what the Greenlandic government has said they can do. So the tension is already there.

28:41But it's a hard one to discuss whether you can actually block it or not, because we do have an old agreement as a kingdom with the US in terms of bases, but not in terms of drilling. And also the whole base agreement has some old stuff hanging between the countries, because there's about 36-ish different old bases that the US left, but they also left a lot of pollution. so we have a history of a lot of pollution coming in the wake of the u.s involvement in greenland and that's what they want to try to prevent so whether this is gonna go straight into the whole defense situation i don't know but it could actually impact the the whole discussions that are going on well i just wonder if you're fudging it a bit there i mean this is not military equipment so that all those agreements have got nothing to do with it it is drilling equipment and it's and there's no permission to land it.

29:37And so, I mean, push has come to shove, hasn't it? This is the moment. If you want to defend Greenland's sovereignty, Denmark needs to act, doesn't it? Or am I getting that wrong? Yeah. And this is, so the thing is that you have to remember Greenlandic is a self-governing territory. So when it comes to raw materials, it's their own prerogative to act on it, whereas defense and security is on the kingdom as such. So that's both nuke in Copenhagen. So it depends on whether Greenland wants to take it up the notch and say, this is not only raw materials, but it's also security. And I think those discussions may be going on behind the scene right now, because that's what you want to take into consideration.

30:24On the other hand, you don't want to poke Donald Trump's temper anymore. So I think there are a lot of discussions going on behind the lines right now to figure what level are we going to deal with this? Am I right to presume that Greenland – I mean, it's such a helpful interview because you're explaining exactly what's going on. But would it be right to say Greenland doesn't actually have the capacity to stop it? So even if it wanted to stop this stuff, it couldn't? It couldn't. And there are two reasons for why they couldn't because they have these old permissions given. I think it was in 2015 and 2019 they were given permissions.

30:59And if you want drawback or drill permissions, you would have a huge compensation discussion after that. I mean, they would come out with a big lawsuit on Greenland. They couldn't be able to pay that. And the other part is Greenland and Denmark do not by ourselves have the military power to set up against the US. I don't think any country in the world could match the US. So those are the two different lines it could be in. So there's both the financial and the defence perspective. Thank you so much. That was Sascha Faxer there, former Danish MP. I think it's fair to say it's one of the iron rules of European politics that Serbia is close to Russia.

31:44It's been that way for over 200 years, from the time when Imperial Russia protected Orthodox Christians there through to Russian support for Serbia over Kosovo. And now the Serbian president, Alexander Vukic, refusing to impose sanctions on Moscow over Ukraine, despite that impacting Serbia's desire to join the European Union. So it's quite interesting that today Ukraine's president, Vladimir Zelensky, is in Serbia. Dr. Helena Ivanov is an associate research fellow at the Henry Jackson Society. It's a think tank on foreign policy and defence and security and so on. She's actually based in Belgrade.