The Spanish government says it will pass a decree to extend public health care to foreigners without residence permits as part of new migration policies.
The government’s spokeswoman, Isabel Celaa, announced Friday a series of measures that will “put people’s rights first” and distance the new center-left cabinet from the previous conservative administration.
Celaa says the government will assess through technical reports how to remove, “without losing any security,” the barbed wire capping the fences of Ceuta and Melilla, the two Spanish enclaves in northern Africa.
Hundreds suffer injuries every year when they try to get onto European soil from Morocco.
Celaa, also minister of education, says the new measures shouldn’t encourage more arrivals, because migrants are on the move anyway to escape poverty and violence.
Pope Francis says that the Gospel teaches that it’s wrong to leave migrants “at the mercy of the waves,” an apparent critique of Italy’s new migration policies.
The pope made the comments Friday during an audience with Italian workers. It was the second time in as many days that the Argentine Jesuit has referred to the plight of refugees after Italy’s decision to refuse entry to a rescue boat with 600 migrants aboard.
In his speech, Francis lamented how many people in the world are excluded from work because of war or environmental degradation and said that those living comfortable lives should seek to help them.
The Gospel, he said, “teaches us and our world to not leave to the mercy of the waves those who leave their lands hungry for bread and justice.”
