Spain imposes visas on certain nationalities due to chaos at Madrid airport

Spain announced on Wednesday that it will require a transit visa for Senegalese stopping in the country, a requirement it already imposed on Kenyans, amid an avalanche of asylum seekers that has collapsed facilities at the Madrid airport.

The measure for the Senegalese will come into force on February 19, reported the Spanish embassy in Senegal on the social network X.

Spanish authorities began on Saturday requiring transit visas for Kenyan citizens stopping at Spanish airports.

Unions of the Spanish police, the institution responsible for immigration, have been denouncing for months that citizens of some African countries who travel to destinations such as Brazil, stop in Madrid and request asylum.

The Madrid-Barajas airport, the busiest in Spain, has registered since August a “exponential increase” in the number of asylum seekers, which has overwhelmed the areas dedicated to housing them, stated the NGO Spanish Commission for Refugee Assistance (CEAR).

“Overcrowding and unsanitary conditions have reached critical points, causing bedbug infestations, accumulation of garbage and a shortage of towels for personal hygiene.“CEAR noted in a statement.

Of the 390 people trapped in conditions “unworthy” at the airport, some 182 have not been able to formalize their asylum request, according to CEAR.

Those waiting to make their request are, for the most part, from Senegal, Morocco, Somalia, Venezuela and Colombia.

““We are working to avoid (…) fraudulent use during flight stopovers.” of “citizens who have every right to travel to countries”, mainly in Latin America, which does not require a visa, the Spanish Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, had warned last Friday in Rabat.

“If airport transit visas have to be introduced, then they will be introduced (…) which is not in contradiction with having a system, like the one we have, of asylum, of guarantee of human rights”he added.