A view of the fence separating Morocco and Spain on Morocco's north coast. ( Photo: CGTN)
At 8 a.m., it was a hot summer day when CGTN's crew left their hotel in the Spanish enclave Ceuta on Morocco's north coast, word was spreading fast that hundreds of Sub-Saharan African migrants had made a mass assault on the fence separating Morocco from Spain with the motive to enter Spanish & European territories.
To do so, they had to breach the parallel six-meter, or nearly 20-foot-tall fence topped with razor wire.
Initial reports suggested that some 600 migrants had gotten through into Ceuta, one of Spain's two territories on Morocco's north coast, where an external European border stretches for eight kilometers.
Suddenly, we were rushing to Ceuta's migrant center, high atop a hill, where the Africans had gone after clearing the fence.
The first sight as we arrived was a road filled with discarded shoes, heavy pullovers, and gloves, many of them with gaping holes and some stained with blood. In the scorching heat, the migrants no longer needed their protective clothing against the razor wire.
Many of the 600 migrants who breached the fence were still outside the migrant center because they couldn't all be checked in at once. They waited under the watchful eye of police, who themselves were wearing gloves and masks as protection until the migrants could get a medical check-up to determine if they had infectious diseases.
The young migrant men were jubilant, having achieved their dream of reaching Europe.
About 130 migrants, the Red Cross said, suffered injuries in the assaults. Several had blood on their hands, arms, legs and foreheads, but they didn't seem to mind.
Spain's new Socialist government has vowed to do "everything possible" to remove the razor wire. The assault hasn't changed that intention, said Juan Hernandez, senior aide to Spain's top official in Ceuta.
"Eliminating the razor wire, yes. But only after other security measures are in place to stop these kinds of avalanches, which are unsustainable for the city of Ceuta," Hernandez said. "There can be elements that will guarantee security while eliminating the razor wire, which causes unfortunate damage."
But there's no timetable for the removal, even if the current Spanish government's position is a change from the previous conservative administration.
Most of the migrants in Ceuta stay for a few months before moving on to the Spanish mainland, a one-hour ferry ride across the Strait of Gibraltar and then trying to reach France or other European destinations, according to Spanish and Red Cross officials.
Tents were erected as temporary housing as the center, with a capacity for 500, was already overflowing before those new arrivals.
Spanish Civil Guard spokesman Alfonso Cruzado said the highly-coordinated migrant assault also included new and troubling tactics, such as using various electric saw to cut through the fence.
Fifteen Civil Guards were injured after some migrants threw quicklime at them and even excrement in an attempt to hamper their response.
Civil Guards and their Moroccan counterparts were able to turn back about 200 migrants to Morocco in the assault, which added more fuel to Europe's already heated debate over immigration.