Spain’s biggest union has urgently called for help for the Balearic Islands as the number of migrants arriving in small boats threatens to overwhelm the holiday hotspots loved by Brits. Almost 3,000 migrants have made the perilous journey from North Africa towards the islands of Ibiza, Majorca, Menorca and Formentera.
The arrival of desperate migrants on the shores of the holiday islands has sparked panic among residents. Official figures state that between January 1 and June 30, 2025, 2,980 illegal immigrants arrived on 147 small boats, more than 3.5 times the number for the same timescale last year. In total, in 2024, 5,924 people landed illegally on the Balearic coasts, an increase of 160% over the previous year.
The CCOO, Working Council of Workers, said the Maritime Rescue Service and Rescue Coordination Centre (CCS) in Palma, on the island of Majorca, had been without maintenance staff for six months and called for Madrid to urgently assist the island in coping with the influx of migrants.
The migration crisis, like for the UK, has only got worse this year and holidaymakers have been greeted by the horror of seeing human remains from those struggling to reach the islands washed up on beaches. It’s reported at least 15 bodies have been recovered from the sea so far this year.
In a shocking recent a group of bodies were found with their hands and feet bound in the waters close to Ibiza. Authorities believe they were from a migrant vessel which made it to Alicante on the Spanish mainland at the weekend.
Police chief Alejandro Hernández said: “We believe that these bodies that appeared here were migrants who were travelling in a boat that arrived in Alicante.”
According to the Majorca Bulletin, if the current surge in migrants arriving by small boat increases at the same rate per year, around 243%, then the number of arrivals in the Balearics by the end of 2025 could reach 15,000.
The regional government of the Balearic Islands has been considering asking Frontex, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, for help stopping the boats.
When Frontex started working with Greek and Turkish authorities around the Greek island of Lesbos, the number of migrants dropped sharply after both countries adopted a “push-back” approach turning around small boats at sea to the shoreline from which they had been launched.
According to the UNHCR there have been 6,584 migrant crossings into Spain via what it calls the Western Mediterranean route since the start of 2025. As well as those landing on the Balearic Islands, there have also been arrivals onto mainland Spain in the regions of Andalusia, Murcia and Valencia.
