Spain announces new border controls with Italy in migration row

Spain is to impose new border controls for flights and ships from Italy as the two countries' row over the influx of migrants into Ceuta intensifies.

The Spanish government said passport, nationality and visa checks would be conducted for Italian passengers and visitors from other countries arriving from Italy from midnight ​on Saturday ‌until 7 September.

The decision has been taken "amid the persistent irregular migratory pressure" from Italy, it added.

It comes after Italy ​applied its own measures, ​which it said ⁠were motivated by the mass ⁠migration rush on Spain's African ​enclave of Ceuta on 30 July.

Around 72,000 people illegally entered Ceuta from Morocco in a 24-hour period, but the vast majority have since returned to the North African country, according to Spanish estimates.

Italy has said it will keep in place its suspension of Schengen rules for non-EU nationals arriving from Spain ​until at least 15 August.

Before announcing its own new border controls, the Spanish government had called Italy's measures "unjust, contrary ‌to EU interests and discriminatory to ‌the population of Spain" and threatened to impose countermeasures.

The open-border Schengen area agreement allows more than 450m people free travel between member countries without going through border controls, including 25 of the 27 EU member states.

At least 80 migrants died during the mass influx into Ceuta, including some who drowned and others who were killed in a stampede to cross a breakwater barrier. Eleven deaths were reported on the Moroccan side of the border.

Extra police and forensic investigators have been sent to the area to speed up the identification process.

Most of the dead will be buried in Ceuta in the coming days, Spanish officials said.

For ​the vast majority who won't be named before then, staff have taken fingerprints and DNA samples and will keep working to connect the bodies with names, and then with relatives.

Jamal Bahloul, 26, said his 22-year-old ⁠brother Mohamed, a construction worker, left his home in Tangier and was last in contact on 30 July.

"We have heard nothing more. We don't know whether he is in Ceuta or ‌he died," Mr Bahloul said.

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Other relatives are gathering at the Moroccan side of the border to press officials for answers and visit local morgues.

Post-mortem examinations revealed many of the 80 people whose bodies ‌were brought ashore in Spain died from cardiopulmonary arrests - a common feature of drownings, pathologists said.

The crisis has sparked anti-immigration rhetoric across Europe and diplomatic tensions within the European Union over border policy, with Spain accusing some allies of an "unhelpful and polarising" response.

(c) Sky News 2026: Spain announces new border controls with Italy in migration row