Morocco, Spain police investigate death in Melilla
Body of 17-year-old Cameroonian found near border fence after clashes
El Pais Spain | T. BÁRBULO / A. E.
Madrid
Spain and Morocco's security forces are investigating the
death of a Cameroonian boy whose body was found a short distance
from the border fence where a group of 300 would-be immigrants
battled police on Sunday night in an attempt to force their way
into Melilla. The body of the youth, identified as
17-year-old Joe Ypo, was found shortly after 7pm on Monday on
the Moroccan side of the border. In the same area 17 hours
earlier the group of mostly sub-Saharan migrants had used
makeshift ladders in an attempt to scale the barbed-wire fence
that rings the Spanish North African enclave. They were fought
back by 80 Spanish Civil Guard officers armed with riot gear as
well as Moroccan border guards, resulting in injuries to 10
officers and three immigrants. Eighty-seven of the assailants
were arrested by Moroccan police. The Spanish government
delegate in Melilla, José Fernández Chacón, said
yesterday that there is a great deal of "conjecture"
surrounding how the Cameroonian youth died, and why neither
Spanish nor Moroccan officers found the body until late on
Monday afternoon. He indicated, however, that the youth
probably died on Monday, and that his body, laid out on one of
the makeshift ladders, was brought to the border area by a group
of around 30 sub-Saharan Africans, several of whom were
subsequently interviewed by Moroccan police. "We're
investigating the case and at the moment we don't know where
or how he died," Fernández Chácon
said. Several of the immigrants involved in the
fence-storming on Sunday argued, however, that the youth had
been beaten on the Spanish side of the border, and that Civil
Guard officers had placed his body on the Moroccan side of the
fence. "He was beaten until he could no longer move
and then his body was deported to Morocco," SOS Racismo, a
charity that helps immigrants, said in a statement after
interviewing some of the sub-Saharan Africans involved in
Sunday's clashes.
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