Are there still daily boatloads of immigrants arriving at the canary islands? I saw reports on TVE internacional on telediario for ages that there were 1,000's arriving weekly, but it hasn't mentioned it for ages. I wondered if they have stopped coming.

I don't think they're coming so often now because of all the tourist lining the beaches of the Canary Islands. Might make landing a bit more challenging with so many people watching you disembark. Kind of conspicuous. Maybe the next ones will come after the summer season but sometimes they don't wait. I've seen video of sunbathers helping the lame and dying out of these boats and assisting the Red Cross personnel right there among the sandcastles and beach towels.

Most of the boats are intercepted somewhere off the coast but sometimes they slip through - which I find amazing in this day and age of technology, lasers, scanners, radar, infrared, satellite imagery, whatever.

HERE\'S AN ARTICLE from July 4th.

Saludos, MadridMan

I saw that footage too, of tourists helping them onto the beach. Do you know what has happened to them all, were they allowed to stay in Spain or were they moved on? I cannot open the link to the article, it keeps saying done but with errors on the page, and it's a blank page.

That's odd about the link. It works for me when clicking. Here it is: http://www.lavanguardia.es/lv24h/20070704/51369510988.html

We never know what happens to them all but non or ALMOST none of them are allowed to stay. Spain has periodic transport airplanes back to their country and these always make the news. But obviously many aren't caught or detained as evidence by the "Top Manta" sellers of pirated DVDs, Music CDs, and the like on the streets of Madrid, Barcelona, Granada and, well, just about everywhere. These are almost always Subsaharan people.

Saludos, MadridMan

Thanks MadridMan for the information.

Actually, I believe very few of them ever get returned to their countries of origen. The holding areas in the Canaries are overwhelmed and after a certain amount of time, 45 days (?), they have to be paroled if they can't be sent back.

What does that mean? What happens when they are paroled?

When police capture ilegal inmigrants arriving in the Spanish coasts they try to send them back to their home countries.
The problem is when they don't have any document and they declare that they cannot remember where are they from.
Then police cannot deport them and they have to set them free.

Major problem;do not know how it can be solved:other than help their countries provide more...that means getting rid of thieves,thugs,and dictators.
Policing in very difficult,so the problem will only gets worse.
The Canary Islands are small and very near very poor areas on the continent.

Well the problem is getting worse everywhere, even in the USA.
80% of the world's population live in poverty so it is normal that they try to escape that situation. Globalization spreads information fastly, now they know where the rich live.
Something must be done. The sea or a huge wall will not stop the crowds.
As the Spanish proverb says: "No se pueden poner puertas al campo".