The Diplomat
The Minister of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, José Luis Escrivá, announced yesterday that Spain will have three reception centers for Ukrainian refugees in Madrid, Alicante and Barcelona, from which they will be referred to different autonomous communities for reception.
“It is a challenge from the humanitarian and reception point of view,” said the minister during an interview on Las Mañanas de RNE. “We are working from day one so that our reception system is prepared to respond to the Ukrainian emergency. We have a new European framework, which is the temporary protection directive, which simplifies all the procedures for people fleeing the war and which is a fundamental novelty”, he assured.
Escrivá specified that the centers of reception and first reception of refugees will be located near the main networks of the Ukrainian community in Spain and will be located in the center of formation of the Social Security of Pozuelo de Alarcón (Madrid), in the City of the Light of Alicante and in Barcelona, where two possible locations are considered. According to Escrivá, these three centers will have more than 6,000 places, pending the number of people that Spain will have to take in.
The three centers, which may be expanded, will facilitate the procedures provided for in the international protection directive. “They are reception and first reception centers where the whole documentary process is done, that they know their rights and what we are going to do for them. Also an interview, a first interaction with them that will allow us to refer them to the most appropriate resources for them,” he explained.
The Ministry is also contemplating the possibility of providing accommodation in hotels close to the reception centers so that the Ukrainians can spend the first few nights before being referred to other destinations where they will have a more stable reception. In this sense, Escrivá highlighted the solidarity and the high number of offers from all the authorities for the reception of the Ukrainian refugees.
Many of the refugees who have arrived so far, according to the minister, have done so through the diaspora networks of Ukrainians already living in Spain, who number around 130,000. “Some people have arrived at our international protection resources, but very few, and it is not known how many will arrive,” so “we must be prepared,” he explained.
In addition, the Government is working with the Ukrainian authorities and consular services around Romania, Hungary, Moldova, and remains “in permanent contact with the Ukrainian Embassy in Madrid and with Ukrainian associations, as well as with the Spanish Embassies in Poland, Romania, Slovakia”, to facilitate “the arrival in Spain of people who want to come to our country”, including children who were living in centers or who are alone, some of them with diseases and with disabilities. “We are preparing mechanisms, all the transportation. Once they arrive here, we are preparing reception operations like the one this summer for Afghanistan,” he explained.
As for regularization, Escrivá assured that the objective is to simplify the whole process of accreditation in Spain and obtaining protection status and work and residence status. “We are finalizing with the Ministries concerned in case it is necessary to make any regulatory adjustments, so that it is a simplified procedure compared to the regular procedure,” he said.
