Spain denies abuse of Senegalese immigrants

-- Spain has denied that 99 illegal Senegalese immigrants were badly treated when they were repatriated this week.

On Thursday, two Senegalese ministers criticised the Spanish police, claiming immigrants were "handcuffed and tricked" into returning from the Canary Islands to Dakar in Senegal.

However, the secretary of state for foreign affairs, Bernardino Leon, on Friday stated "clearly there was no abuse" and insisted that the Spanish police who repatriated the Senegalese were congratulated by Dakar civil servants when they arrived in Senegal.

Farba Senghor, Senegalese minister of agriculture, had claimed the Spanish authorities told the immigrants they were going to Malaga. When the immigrants discovered they were not being taken to Malaga, they refused to get off the plane when it arrived at Dakar, Senegalese police said. --