Spain Revises Ceuta Minors Count Down to ~1,500 After Database Duplicates Found

Spain's Interior Ministry lowers its estimate of unaccompanied migrant minors in Ceuta from the 2,168 reported on August 18 to roughly 1,500, after a database audit finds that some procedures involving the same child had been recorded as separate cases. The minors — including children from conflict-affected countries such as Chad and Sudan — remain in Ceuta while authorities weigh transferring them to other Spanish regions or repatriating them, a decision complicated by a 2021 Supreme Court ruling that bars blanket returns of unaccompanied minors to Morocco and requires individual case assessment. The government has scheduled a meeting with Spain's autonomous regions to discuss distribution.