Melilla border fence

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The Melilla border fence is a separation barrier between Morocco and the Spanish city of Melilla. Constructed by Spain, its stated purpose is to stop illegal immigration and smuggling.

In October 2005, over 700 SubSaharan migrants camping on nearby Mount Gurugú tried to enter Spanish territory from the Moroccan border. Many of them were shot in the back, apparently from the Moroccan Gendarmerie Royale positions.

Before the third fence came to be implemented following this and similar incidents, the mountainous buffer zone between Spanish and Moroccan border patrol positions which lies next to the fence registered a hectic activity with subsaharan people provisionally camped there while preparing massive assaults on the fence, something which became a tactic in order to outnumber the Spanish border patrols.

Massive intrussions (or "assaults" at the fence, as the Spanish press put it) of subsaharan people via Melilla had become a Spanish and, to some extent, European Union issue, which prompted the Spanish government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero in 2005 to build up a third fence next to the two deteriorated existing ones, in order to completely seal the border outside of the regular checkpoints.

This third razor wire barrier cost Spain €33 million (US$35 million) to construct. It consists of 11 km (7 miles) of parallel 3 m (10 ft) high fences topped with barbed wire, with regular watchposts and a road running between them to accommodate either police patrols or ambulance service in case of need. Underground cables connect spotlights, noise and movement sensors, and video cameras to a central control booth. Its height is currently being doubled to 6 m. since the immigrants were surpassing the previous fences equipped with self made stairs. Also, in order to facilitate the intruder's detention, devices to slow them harmlessly were added.

Apparently the new fence has succeeded in deterring new massive intrussions and the subsaharian campings in the buffer zone have mostly disbanded. From these, Amnesty International and Médecins Sans Frontières accused the Moroccan government of dumping over 500 people of various subsaharan countries (some of them claiming to be validly registered as political refugees) in an unhabitted are in the Sahara Desert without food or water supplies.

Morocco has objected to the construction of the barrier since it does not recognize Spanish sovereignty in Melilla.