Spanish infantry soldiers watch a group of migrants sitting on the ground near the border post, prior to escorting them back to Morocco, in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta.
Dalila Olmo López, Anthony Faiola, Mohamad El Chamaa
CEUTA, Spain - Tens of thousands of migrants were expelled from this tiny Spanish city on the coast of North Africa almost as quickly as they came, and calm returned to the beaches and sidewalks, after a mass breach of the border from Morocco. For Spain, however, the political fallout and intrigue only deepened at the weekend.
The crisis, which began Thursday, instantly became a touchstone in the global migrant debate, alarming European capitals and drawing outrage in Washington. But the highly unusual crowds pushing into Ceuta - still a ferry ride from European soil - raised suspicions that the viral incident was orchestrated and tied to international politics.
Spain succeeded in returning the vast majority of the up to 60,000 migrants who arrived in recent days and asserted Saturday that the exclave of 83,000 residents had returned to “normality.” At least 67 people died during the incident, officials said.
