Spain's spy agency warned of Ceuta border breach plans before crisis, declassified files show

Madrid — Spain's national intelligence agency issued multiple warnings before the Ceuta border crisis about a potential mass crossing of migrants from Morocco into the Spanish exclave in late July, according to declassified documents released by the government on Wednesday.The trove of 40 documents, which includes alerts, intelligence reports, charts and communications from multiple law enforcement and intelligence agencies, appears to undermine what Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has said about the level of warning the government had before the sudden influx took place. There have been major protests in Spain in response to the migrant arrivals, with critics blaming the Sánchez government for its handling of the crisis, and his political opponents accusing him of pandering to Morocco. On July 29, a day before more than 72,000 people began pouring into the Spanish city neighboring Morocco, Spain's spy agency, the National Intelligence Center (CNI), sent an alert via WhatsApp to the Spanish government's delegation in Ceuta about calls on social media "for an assault on the fence and by sea tomorrow at 8 p.m." "There are two different groups with a total of 180,000 followers," ...