Amnesty fails to ease Spanish worries over illegal immigration

Leslie Crawford:

Critics of the amnesty say the regularisation of foreign workers will not end the flow of illegal immigrants, and may even encourage more. Within the European Union, Spain's policy has raised fears that immigrants will use their residency cards to move deeper into Europe.

The Socialist government's effort to end the exploitation of illegal labour has, meanwhile, coincided with a dramatic turn in sentiment against Spain's immigrant community, which has grown five-fold since 1999.

Spain's population census, updated last month by the National Statistics Institute, registered an increase of 650,000 foreign residents since January 2004, bringing their total to 3.69m, or 8.4 per cent of the population of 44m. In 1999, fewer than 750,000 foreigners resided in Spain. Racism is on the rise. Residents of Villaverde, a poor neighbourhood in southern Madrid, went on the rampage last week, attacking immigrant-owned shops and chasing Africans and Latin Americans off the streets, following the murder of a Spanish youth. "We want immigrants, not criminals," the residents chanted.

The European Observatory against Racism, based in Vienna, says Spanish intolerance is hardening as immigrants are increasingly associated with crime and terrorism. SOS Racismo, a Spanish charity, has detected an increase in the activities of extreme rightwing groups, most notably in the terraces of soccer stadiums, where skinheads, known as "Ultras", pelt black players with bananas. SOS Racismo says there are more than 400 websites linked to extreme rightwing groups in Spain.

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