ECtHR legitimises mass pushback of migrants

13th February 2020 – Grand Chamber

Bartholomew Scholefield assesses the significance of Strasbourg’s long-awaited Grand Chamber judgement in the case of ND & NT v Spain, published on 13 February 2020. The judgement is available in full here.

The Facts

The Spanish enclave of Melilla is a 12sq. km autonomous city located on the north coast of Africa and surrounded by Moroccan territory. The border between Morocco and Melilla is an external border to the Schengen area and thus provides access to the EU, making it a destination for many asylum seekers.

ND and NT were Malian asylum seekers who had made reached Morocco by August 2014. Early in the morning of the 13th August ND and NT, along with approximately 600 other migrants, stormed the fences surrounding Melilla. ND and NT made it over the exterior 6m ‘climb-proof’ fence, a “three dimensional network of cables” followed by a second fence, and finally to the top of the third and final 6m fence. They waited atop this fence for approximately 8 hours with 80 other migrants.