The counter-investigation is the most complete reconstruction and analysis of June 24th 2022. It shows how the incidents were both anticipated and orchestrated by Spanish and Moroccan officers - and that both forces trapped and attacked people in an enclosed area on Spanish territory, causing deaths and injuries. Led by Border Forensics, the investigation is co-authored by Irídia - Center for the Defense of Human Rights with additional support and legal advice from ECCHR, continuing a decade of work focussed on this border.

"Justice must prevail, the young people must be released from prison and the missing must be identified. We too have friends who have disappeared and we want to know whether they are dead or alive." 

                                                                                              - Moustapha Ali Ibrahim, survivor

In the early morning of June 24, 2022, around 2000 people on the move, mainly Sudanese, but also Chadian, Eritrean, Cameroonian and Guinean, attempted to cross the border fence separating the Moroccan town of Nador and the Spanish-controlled enclave of Melilla. 

In the weeks before, Moroccan officers had evicted them from their informal camps and continued persecuting them. On that day officers directed them towards the Barrio Chino border post. Once inside this enclosed space, they were blocked in and targeted indiscriminately with tear gas, rubber bullets and stones by Spanish and Moroccan forces.

The darkest moments were invisible until now. No audio visual materials documenting the height of the massacre have been released until today. Through personal testimonies, this investigation accounts for these darkest moments.

"You can’t imagine the blood flowed like water – I had blood coming out of my head, and I spread it on myself ... There I was, standing next to a dead body, I lifted it up and hid under it." 

                                                                                                                 - Abderrazik, survivor

Contrary to Spain’s assertions, the counter-investigation describes how the main cause of death was not asyphxia due to the crush of bodies – but was caused by the actions of officers. Many deaths took place in the border area under the control of Moroccan officers; however this does not absolve Spain of responsibility. An analysis of historical documents establishes how the entire border structure lies on Spanish territory. The 3D reconstruction also shows that Spanish officers had direct vision of the violence, yet they continued to unlawfully return people there.

Following Spain’s long-standing practice of “hot returns”, 470 survivors were expelled from Spain without being identified and without access to any protection rights or legal remedies.

Handcuffed whilst injured, survivors were bussed to remote locations in Morocco. Thus, Spain ensured these survivors would remain unidentified, already thwarting future justice initiatives. Instead, criminal law was used to further persecute and silence survivors who are now held in Moroccan prisons. Meanwhile the corpses of the victims were secretly buried or remain in morgues.

"The morgue was described as saturated with bodies for months. This indicates that the bodies of those who died are more numerous than the confirmed number of deaths"

                                            - THE NADOR-MELILLA BORDER TRAP, a counter-investigation

This was not simply a tragedy.

The investigation identifies the roots of the massacre reaching far back into the racial and colonial dimension of the border which still drives present-day racism and anti-black violence and is evident in the complicity of legal institutions which have consolidated a regime of impunity.

This is a continuation of what we, as ECCHR, have been documenting and challenging over the last decade. It was a strategy already evident during the deadly Tarajal border operations of February 2014, when 15 individuals were killed attempting to enter Spain’s Ceuta enclave from Morocco.

Ludovic N., a survivor of the deadly Tarajal pushback recently filed a complaint against Spain to the UN Committee Against Torture with the support of ECCHR. He was 15 years old when he was beaten, and tear gassed by Guardia Civil officers and then directly pushed back to Morocco. Ludovic N. was prevented from testifying in Spain and is now challenging years of investigative failures.

As a team we are committed to documenting, analysing and challenging illegal border practices. The necessity of our work has only intensified. The results of the EU elections and the series of harmful asylum and migration laws recently greenlighted by the EU parliament have paved the way for an increase in pushbacks and border violence on land and at sea, as well as the further criminalization of solidarity. 

We will continue to fight for human rights at borders. Your support in this long struggle in invaluable and helps us retain our independence. 

Thank you! 

Your ECCHR Team