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BRUSSELS — EU interior ministers sought to draw a line under five days of bitter recriminations over the arrival of 72,000 migrants in Ceuta, closing ranks behind Spain and accusing smugglers and foreign actors of exploiting the crisis to divide the bloc.
The show of solidarity marked a sharp shift after EU leaders publicly blamed Madrid’s migration policies for creating a crisis they warned could spill across Europe, prompting Italy to suspend air and sea links with Spain.
Following a three-hour emergency meeting in Brussels on Tuesday, ministers praised Spain’s response, stressed that the passport-free Schengen zone had never been at risk and called for tighter coordination among capitals during future migration emergencies.
The meeting followed days of unusually public anger at Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. In a letter signed by 22 EU leaders, governments demanded tougher action to stop irregular arrivals, while Italy suspended air and sea transit with Spain over fears that migrants could move onward through the Schengen area. Sánchez hit back by urging his counterparts to show “understanding” rather than turn Spain into a scapegoat for a crisis on the EU’s external border.
