MADRID, July 18 (Xinhua) -- A total of 10,751 undocumented immigrants were able to enter Spain by either land or sea during the first half of 2017, according to details confirmed by Spanish Interior Minister Juan Ignacio Zoido on Tuesday.
The minister said the figure was over twice the number of illegal immigrants who entered the country during the same period last year.
Zoido said the Spanish North-African enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla were a favored point of entry with 3,204 people travelling to Spain after passing through the two cities, which are officially on European Union (EU) soil.
Virtually the only ways for immigrants to enter Ceuta and Melilla are to attempt the dangerous swim to one of the cities' beaches, or to be smuggled over the border inside a vehicle (some of which are specially adapted by people smugglers for the task) or to attempt to scale the six-meter border fence, which is covered in razor wire.
Zoido said attempts to scale the fence had "intensified" in 2017 with 5,266 incidents recorded, in comparison with 3,472 in the first six months of 2016.
He also said that the "migration phenomenon," was one of the Spanish government's "priorities," and that following the recent deaths of 49 people in the Alboran Sea, "everything possible would be done to help" immigrants.
However, he said it was "not the responsibility" of the Spanish government that immigrants had "decided to run away from their homelands" in "boats that hardly float," and added that Spain's capacity to welcome immigrants was limited.
