The Policía Nacional have had a busy 24 hours in pursuit of illegal immigrants following the discovery of an abandoned boat on the beach at Calblanque on Friday. The boat had been detected by the SIVE vigilance system when very close to the shore, but the patrol vessel despatched to the area had been unable to locate the vessel at sea, and its whereabouts had not been ascertained until the abandoned vessel was discovered at Calblanque.
A large scale search had begun for the inhabitants of the boat, involving four sets of officers, and a helicopter, but no clues as to the whereabouts of the newly arrived immigrants were found until a call came in at 11.15am that a woman had been mugged and her handbag stolen. Officers hot-footed it to the scene and caught up with 3 of the immigrants, who were arrested after what is described as a "fuerte resistencia" , concerted resistance on the part of the detainees. A GPS system was discovered amongst the belongings they were carrying, together with a compass.
An hour and a half later another 70 year old lady had also been attacked and her handbag stolen, this time in the public parking area of Calle Real, and had required medical assistance after being pushed to the floor during the robbery.
All four have been referred to the judicial services and held in detention. It has not been reported how many people had arrived in the boat.
Salvamento Marítimo were also back in action following the detection of another boat, this one containing 10 illegal algerian immigrants, detected by the SIVE radars at 14 miles from Cartagena, off the Cabo de Palos coastline.
The boat was detected around 4pm and a patrol vessel, the Salvador Mimosa, detached to pick up the immigrants, who arrived in Cartagena at 6.45pm.
Once all had received a medical check-over, the 10 were transferred to the Santomera transit centre, for repatriation proceedings which will return them to their country of origin.
Updated Sunday 5th August
Another boatload of illegal immigrants was detected yesterday, and its passengers detained, following a call from a Dutch merchant vessel who informed the coastguard that they had sighted a boat 30 miles off the Cartagena coastline. A spotter plane was sent to locate the vessel, and the patrol ship Sasamar brought the illegals into Cartagena at 9pm last night. This is the fourth boat in as many days.20 people were on board, all males and all in a good state of health.
Image: Archive Salvamento Marítimo detaining illegal immigrants at sea.
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