In total, 51 of the 174 migrants who arrived in El Hierro this Saturday are Pakistanis and Syrians, as confirmed by sources from emergency teams and state security forces and agencies.
It is not common for Pakistanis in their migratory process to end up in the Canary Islands and take the Atlantic route, but they are resorting to it after the violent hardening that the passage through the central Mediterranean has undergone.
According to a report published by the Midex Migration Center (MMC), a United Nations collaborating entity, crossings from Turkey to Europe have decreased significantly as Greece has stepped up its maritime patrols and built a border fence along the Evros River. “These events have been accompanied by violent expulsions and systematic violations of the human rights of refugees and migrants, including illegal detention, physical attacks, robberies and humiliation.” The report provides figures on the consequences of this treatment, which it describes as brutal: in February 2022, for example, the bodies of 12 people expelled from Greece were found on the Turkish border, “dying of cold after being stripped of their clothes and shoes.”
According to Midex Migration CenterThe most comprehensive data available on mixed migration to Europe confirm that movements from Pakistan increased significantly in 2023. While Pakistan did not even feature in the International Organization for Migration (IOM) ranking of the top ten countries of origin among arrivals to Europe in 2022, Pakistan was the fifth most represented country in the first half of 2023, with 5,342 arrivals.
MMC explains that they are fleeing violence, insecurity and conflict, lack of rights and freedoms and for economic reasons. “Given the deteriorating economic situation, high unemployment and soaring inflation, it is likely that these factors have changed, and that desperation and lack of opportunities have driven more people to migrate” and warns that “the devastation and displacement caused by last year’s catastrophic floods have only made things worse.
In the cayuco that arrived in La Restinga, according to the crew members who arrived at the port to be taken care of by the Red Cross, there were also people from Senegal, Mali, Gambia and Guinea Conacry, the most frequent nationalities on the Atlantic route. They left the Mauritanian city of Nuackchott and spent five days at sea. There were seven children on the boat.
