Two Guardia Civil aircraft to monitor the Atlantic migratory route

Two Guardia Civil planes will join maritime surveillance work on the Atlantic route starting today, Tuesday, to reinforce the migration management device in the archipelago. A CN-235 will be deployed to Dakar (Senegal) to patrol the coasts of Senegal and Mauritania for the next 45 days, and a Beechcraft Super King Air 350i will join the patrol duties from the Canary Islands.

The acting Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, made the announcement at the Regional Coordination Centre of the Canary Islands, in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, where he chaired a new meeting of the Immigration Coordination Authority, which was attended by the President of the Canarian Government, Fernando Clavijo.

The minister mentioned his visit to Mauritania last Wednesday and his upcoming trip to Senegal to point out that cooperation with the countries of origin and transit of migration is “the best way” to confront illegal immigration. “There are no magic solutions or shortcuts, but rather constant and sustained work over time that Spain has been carrying out for five years and which has prevented, in 2023 alone, the arrival of more than 12,000 migrants to the Canary Islands,” he added.

Along these lines, the minister has specified that cooperation “is not an entelechy” but rather means “less pressure for the islands, fewer lives cut short and it means fighting on the ground, with joint teams of the National Police, Guardia Civil and local police, to the mafias that traffic in people, profiting from desperation.

Grande-Marlaska has attributed to this collaboration the deployment of the maritime surveillance plane of the Guardia Civil in Senegal, “which will begin to work immediately on the forecast and shortcut of departures to the Canary Islands,” he explained.

The minister has also highlighted the “excellent coordination and collaboration” that is making it possible to respond “quickly and effectively” to the increase in irregular arrivals to the Canary Islands, and in particular to the island of El Hierro. “The actions of the National Police and the Guardia Civil, the cooperation of the administrations and the reinforcement of the Government’s mechanism have made possible the immediate referral of migrants to other islands with greater capacity,” he noted.

The two maritime surveillance planes join the reinforcement of troops carried out at the beginning of September in El Hierro, which increased the strength of the Guardia Civil on the island by 18 percent. A dozen agents from the National Police, specialists in Immigration and Borders and in Science, have also permanently joined the island to process the initial screening procedures for migrants.

Likewise, agents from the Reserve and Security Groups of the Guardia Civil have travelled to El Hierro to collaborate in the referral procedures to other islands, transfers in which the Guardia Civil patrol boat Río Segura and its crew have participated.

Grande-Marlaska also highlighted at the meeting the increase in the number of National Police and Guardia Civil staff in the Canary Islands as one of the elements that have helped to confront the migration phenomenon. Staff numbers have increased in the archipelago by 11.8 percent since 2018, exceeding 7,930 personnel for the first time, thus offsetting the loss of more than 630 agents that occurred between 2011 and 2018.

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