Migrant assault on Melilla: A Migratory Flow that looks like Military Operation

A popular Twitter, Carl Johnson’s Twitter (@Crl_Johnson) has shed light on what happened during the assault on Melilla by thousands of African migrants, calling it an operation to kill Moroccan Police Officers.

According to Johnson, the migrants’ assault on #Melilla was an operation to kill Moroccan police officers and not a simple attempt by migrants to cross the border.

The Twitter, in support of his thesis, argued that all the migrants were mostly Sudanese, in addition to Chadians, South Sudanese and Eritreans. They managed to reach the Kingdom by crossing Libya and then Algeria.

Carl Johnson added that it was an unprecedented route, given that migrants from East Africa were not used to going to Morocco stressing that Algeria played a major role in diverting migrants to Morocco, in collusion with smugglers and trafficking networks to reach the Algerian town of Maghnia, located 11km from Morocco, before reaching their final destination.

According to Johnson, a Malian citizen called “Boss” welcomes migrants in a farm and manages the clandestine passages to Morocco adding that the “Boss” works with a brother, an Algerian and a Moroccan who is in charge of guiding the migrants during the clandestine passages.

The migrants entered Morocco in groups of 20 to 40, via Oujda, Berkane and then Nador.

Describing how they operate, John said once gathered in the forest of Nador, they were taken in charge by a 35-year-old Sudanese citizen called Ahmad, who always appears with a hidden face.
Ahmad, who was the only one in contact with the Boss in Algeria, ran an almost military organisation, composed of commanders with each of them leading units of 50 migrants who were trained for a month for the assault. They created sophisticated weapons to attack the Moroccan police using sulphuric acid, he noted.

Les migrants se sont entraînés pendant 1 mois pour l’assaut. Ils ont créé des armes sophistiquées.

Ils comptaient aussi attaquer la police Marocaine avec de l’acide sulfurique. pic.twitter.com/4TjQzppHAX

— Carl Johnson (@Crl_Johnson) July 3, 2022

“The question then is why the migrants targeted a border post which is the most heavily guarded location, when they can scale a less secure and easier to access wall” he quizzed.

He said the reason is simple, “the leaders of the assault wanted an armed confrontation with the Moroccan police and to kill Moroccans”.

But the Moroccan services had intelligence on everything that was happening, not only in the Nador forest, but from the beginning of the operation in great detail. The videos that retraced the migrants’ route were proof that they were being monitored.

Johnson explained that the day before the assault, the police launched a sweep, but the migrants were determined to fight. The police thus decided not to put pressure on them because they would have hidden in town and put the lives of the Moroccans at risk.

The police were aware of the plan for the assault yet chose not to intervene, so that the migrants’ attack strategy would fail. The police intervened after the attack on the border post. Thus, the attack on the police did not take place.

Clearly, this was a paramilitary operation piloted from Maghnia, which the Moroccan police managed perfectly, he said and added that an entirely different scenario would have taken place without the enlightened vision of Moroccan intelligence services.

In conclusion, Carlson’s Twitter post indicates that the Melilla assault is not just a migration issue. It is an attack on Morocco’s territorial integrity and Moroccan and Spanish interests.

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid02XVJcM8YYANBhXMAf6FQCGFz4MoBjiCyoqWfwA41gPWyAZ3RuH3foFp3EGDoj17zKl&id=1177251509