The National Police yesterday started the procedures to deport the 69 Bolivians without visas to enter Spain who were intercepted on a cruise ship that docked in Barcelona on Tuesday. Yesterday the Delegation of the Spanish Government, in coordination with the National Police, denied that travelers who did not have authorization could enter Spanish territory and designated a transit area of the port so that those affected could formalize the papers as an emergency for be sent back to their country, a journey that will be borne by the shipping company.
With the undocumented travelers once disembarked, the MSC cruise ship was able to set sail with the rest of the passengers – more than a thousand – from one in the afternoon to continue its route to the port of Marghera (Italy ), where he plans to arrive on April 8.
Throughout Wednesday, there were negotiations between the Delegation of the Spanish Government, the Police, the port of Barcelona, the company and the Bolivian embassy and a judge on duty in Barcelona to decide how to resolve the situation. Finally, it was decided to enable the area to formalize the immigration procedures and look for a new ship to accommodate those affected. The agreement agreed between the delegate of the Spanish Government, Carlos Prieto, and the executive president of MSC cruises, Pier Francesco Vago, by video conference on Wednesday allowed the passengers to have an adequate space to formalize the necessary foreign procedures and provided of a refreshment area, food and health care.
The shipping company also made available to the travelers a second ship in which they can stay while the formalities are resolved. It is a cruise that the company moved from Livorno, and that docked shortly before two in the afternoon at the port of Barcelona, in which the 69 Bolivian citizens will board and will be there until all the procedures planned so that they can return to their country.
From now on, several scenarios open up. The authorities assure that they will listen "case by case" and solve the cases in a personalized way. Some could seek asylum or international protection, although this is a remote possibility, as Bolivia is not a country that meets the conditions established for its citizens to claim international protection. And the other possibility is that the passengers ask to return to their country of origin or to the starting point of the cruise, in this case, Brazil. The Bolivian consul in Barcelona was yesterday supporting his fellow citizens and their families and asked them to be patient because the procedures, despite the fact that they are of an urgent nature, can take a long time.
On Tuesday, the Police stopped the MSC Armonia, a transoceanic cruise that left Brazil, on which 1,500 passengers were traveling, when they detected that there were 69 Bolivian travelers without a valid visa to enter the Schengen area. Among those affected are 14 children. Some of them paid between 6,000 and 10,000 dollars for the passage and the visa together and reported that they had been the victims of a scam, although it is also not ruled out that some of them saw the possibility of entering Spain. The company assured in a statement that "the passengers seemed to have appropriate documentation when they boarded in Brazil" and that it was not until they arrived in Barcelona that they were "informed by the authorities that the visas were not valid.
