Late last week, some 2,000 illegal migrants tried to cross overland to the Spanish enclave in Africa, but were repelled by Moroccan and Spanish police officers, which resulted in the death of 23 people and up to 37 fatal victims in the past few hours.

The Moroccan regime does not have the courage of bearing the shame. It always looks for a scapegoat to evade its responsibilities, Special Envoy for the Maghrib and Western Sahara at the Algerian Foreign Ministry, Amar Belani, told the press.

The Maghrib (West in Arabic) is an African subregion that includes Algeria, Lybia, Mauritania, Morocco, Western Sahara and Tunisia.

For their part, Moroccan authorities said that 140 police officers were injured in the clashes with the undocumented migrants who crossed the border between Morocco and Algeria.

They added that the attackers’ extreme violence and their strategy indicate a high level of organization and a hierarchical structure of trained leaders with military profiles in conlfict zones, a hint that blames Algeria for the incident.

Relations between both countries have been marked by conflict and have not existed since Algeria broke diplomatic relations in August, 2021, after accusing Morocco of supporting Berber separatists accused of starting several catastrophic forest fires in the northern region of Cabilia.

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