Author: Steve Harrigan
Publication: FoxNews
Date: December 2, 2004
URL: http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=16126
The bodies are anonymous, rotting
in the shallows of the Straits of Gibraltar. The fortunate ones are dragged
out for a hasty burial. They are Africans trying to make it to Europe,
betting their lives on a nine-mile ride, thousands losing that bet each
year.
Spain used to be an open door for
illegal immigrants. An estimated one-quarter of all smuggled immigrants
into Europe came through the Southern coast of Spain, most setting off
from Morocco.
The sticks and stones of frustrated
border guards had little effect against a rising tide of human traffic.
But all that changed on March 11.
Most of the terrorists who killed 190 people on commuter trains in Madrid
were Moroccan. Suddenly, the immigrant problem was a security problem.
Under pressure at home and from
other European nations, rubber batons at the border were replaced by speedboats
but success, so far, is limited.
"The numbers are down here by 50
percent," said Lt. David Oliva of the Spanish Border Guard. "But the smugglers
are just moving to other parts of the coast."
Although only nine miles separate
Africa from Europe, that stretch contains some of the most dangerous currents
in the world. Now, some people in Africa are so desperate, they are ready
to pay $1,000 a head just to get across, and they'll take their chances
on anything that floats.
Seventy-five people from the Moroccan
village of Tangier drowned trying to cross the waters last month. When
FOX News approached families of the victims, they started to cry. One man
lost 21 relatives.
With no electricity, jobs, education,
or running water, there is nothing to do but wait for someone to get them
out of the area. "These people are so desperate they are ready to die,"
said Khalil Jemmah, a Moroccan aid worker. "It's just a question of who
gets here first, the smugglers or the terrorists."
More often than not, it's the terrorists
who are getting there first.
It was a Moroccan who is accused
of killing filmmaker Theo Van Gogh in the Netherlands this month. The murder
set off weeks of ethnic and religious clashes and skirmishes in Spain in
what may eventually become a pan-European battle, fueled by the failure
to integrate a new, illegal Muslim population.
Steve Harrigan is a reporter for
FoxNews.