SPAIN: Spain yesterday demanded that Africa do more to stop illegal migration as the number of desperate Africans arriving in the Canary Islands after a risky voyage on packed boats broke new records.
"We aren't going to continue accepting the lack of compliance with bilateral and multilateral agreements," deputy prime minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega said in a speech to Spanish ambassadors.
The rate of arrivals from the Canaries hit a new level at the weekend, and the central government's office said 1,965 Africans had arrived there since Friday - almost half the total during the whole of 2005.
"We are prepared to act with all due firmness," she said, adding that everyone arriving in Spain illegally will eventually be made to leave.
Spain is angry that African countries are not co-operating more with the repatriation of their citizens who risk their lives on a dangerous voyage hundreds of kilometres up west African coasts to the Canaries.
Ms Fernandez de la Vega did not say how Spain could prompt more co-operation, although trade, aid and co-operation agreements could provide Madrid with many ways of putting pressure on such poor states, especially if it gets EU backing.
Over 21,000 illegal migrants have landed in the Canary Islands so far in 2006 compared to 4,751 in the whole of 2005.
Spain also wants the European Union to beef up a maritime patrol fleet meant to deter would-be migrants and define a policy for its sea borders.
But the socialist government has had to rebut criticism from the conservative opposition and European Commission vice-president Franco Frattini that its amnesty for 600,000 illegal immigrants in 2005 has tempted more to try to reach mainland Spain.
Ms Fernandez de la Vega did not say how the government would go about repatriating the hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants already estimated to be living there.
Spanish officials say they recognise the root cause of the problem of illegal arrivals in the Canaries is poverty in Africa. Polls show immigration is identified as the country's biggest problem by a growing proportion of Spaniards.
Africans make up a fraction of immigration into Spain, which is running at about 600,000 a year and has transformed a once inward-looking country into a multicultural society in a decade.
Some African states have asked for more aid to stop migrants leaving their shores and accepting planeloads of compatriots repatriated from Spain has proved politically unpopular.