Radar plan to hit drugs trade

Ciaran Giles, SPAIN has activated a costly system of radars and extra-sensitive cameras with night vision along its southern coast in a bid to crack down on trafficking of immigrants and drugs between Morocco and Spain, the government said yesterday.

The 142million Integrated External Vigilance System will enable Civil Guard paramilitary coast patrols to detect and monitor vessels some 20km away from the Spanish coast, the Interior Ministry said.

The ministry said the system was the first of its kind in Europe and was aimed at combating the clandestine trafficking of thousands of would-be immigrants from Morocco to Spain, normally aboard packed, single-engine rubber boats.

The most popular route is across the hazardous Strait of Gibraltar, which is just 14km wide at Tarifa, Europe's southernmost point.

Many of the would-be immigrants are caught and repatriated, while thousands of others slip through.

Thousands are also believed to die in the attempt.

The Civil Guard says it has saved some 730 people from drowning since 2000.

The Moroccan immigrant workers’ association in Spain, ATIME, estimates that some 4,000 have drowned in the past five years.

Interior Minister Angel Acebes launched the system yesterday but the Interior Ministry did not say when the system had been switched on.

Mr Acebes said the system would also help combat hashish traffickers, many of whom also use the Strait to ship their produce to Europe.

The system, an array of mobile and fixed radar towers and cameras on land, sea and in air, will be used in the Strait of Gibraltar. Authorities hope to extend it to most of the southern coast.