Migrant/immigration Thread.
- Thread starter DOS_patos
- Start date
DOS_patos
Unverified Legion of Trill member
Ships unwilling to save Mediterranean migrants after Italy crackdown
Migrants in distress at sea have told their rescuers that several ships passed them by without offering assistance, a European aid group said Sunday while seeking safe harbor for a rescue vessel with 141 migrants aboard.
SOS Mediterranee in a statement said that due to the recent refusal of Italy and Malta to let rescue vessels carrying migrants dock, ships might be now unwilling to get involved fearing they will be stranded with migrants aboard and denied a port to disembark them.
On Friday the group’s chartered ship Aquarius, which it operates in partnership with Doctors Without Borders, rescued 141 people in waters off Libya. Of these, 25 were found adrift on a small wooden boat that had no motor and was believed to have been at sea for about 35 hours, the group said. The other 116 people, including 67 unaccompanied minors, were rescued later that day, it said.
Nearly three-quarters of those rescued originate from Somalia and Eritrea. Many migrants recounted how they were “held in inhumane conditions in Libya,” where human traffickers are based, the aid group aid.
It added that Libya’s rescue coordination authorities wouldn’t provide the Aquarius with “a place of safety” and asked it to request safe harbor from another country’s authorities.
The Aquarius was sailing north in the Mediterranean Sunday in hopes of receiving docking permission from another country.
Migrants in distress at sea have told their rescuers that several ships passed them by without offering assistance, a European aid group said Sunday while seeking safe harbor for a rescue vessel with 141 migrants aboard.
SOS Mediterranee in a statement said that due to the recent refusal of Italy and Malta to let rescue vessels carrying migrants dock, ships might be now unwilling to get involved fearing they will be stranded with migrants aboard and denied a port to disembark them.
On Friday the group’s chartered ship Aquarius, which it operates in partnership with Doctors Without Borders, rescued 141 people in waters off Libya. Of these, 25 were found adrift on a small wooden boat that had no motor and was believed to have been at sea for about 35 hours, the group said. The other 116 people, including 67 unaccompanied minors, were rescued later that day, it said.
Nearly three-quarters of those rescued originate from Somalia and Eritrea. Many migrants recounted how they were “held in inhumane conditions in Libya,” where human traffickers are based, the aid group aid.
It added that Libya’s rescue coordination authorities wouldn’t provide the Aquarius with “a place of safety” and asked it to request safe harbor from another country’s authorities.
The Aquarius was sailing north in the Mediterranean Sunday in hopes of receiving docking permission from another country.
DOS_patos
Unverified Legion of Trill member
Mediterranean: more than 200 migrants drown in three days
More than 200 migrants have drowned at sea in the Mediterranean in the past three days, taking the death toll for the year to more than 1,000 and prompting fears that human traffickers are taking greater risks because of a crackdown imposed by the Italian government and the Libyan coastguard.
The UN refugee agency in Tripoli reported on Monday that 276 refugees and migrants were disembarked in the Libyan capital on Monday, including 16 survivors of a boat carrying 130 people, of whom 114 were still missing at sea. Further shipwrecks were found at the weekend.
On Tuesday the Libyan coastguard reported a further seven deaths and a further 123 migrants rescued.
The 1,000 deaths landmark was reached on 1 July. It is the fourth year in succession that more than 1,000 migrants have died trying to reach Europevia the Mediterranean Sea.
Othman Belbeisi, the chief of mission in Libya at the International Organization for Migration (IOM), claimed the “alarming increase” in deaths at sea was out of the ordinary.
“Smugglers are exploiting the desperation of migrants to leave before there are further crackdowns on Mediterranean crossings by Europe,” he said.
Overall the number of migrants reaching Italy by sea is down on last year’s figures, but the proportion of those trying to reach Italy that are drowning is rising, prompting claims that the stricter Italian government policy is to blame.
Figures prepared by Matteo Villa, a research fellow at the Italian thinktank ISPI, show that so far in 2018 only half of those leaving Libya have made it to Europe, down from 86% last year.
The data shows 44% have been brought back by the Libyan coastguard, compared with 12% last year. A total of 4.5% died or had gone missing, compared with 2.3% last year. But in June, almost one in 10 died or went missing upon departure from the Libyan coast – the highest proportion ever.
The Libyan coastguard has returned about 10,000 people to shore this year, according to the IOM. That trend is likely to continue due to three changes of policy by the new Italian government. It has closed the country’s ports to NGO rescue ships; agreed to send an extra 10 motor launches and two ships, dinghies, equipment, and vehicles to help Libyan coastguard; and extended the search and rescue area for which the Libyan coastguard is responsible, therefore reducing the area in which the NGOs and EU ships have responsibility.
The EU has also reinforced its direction to the NGOs to obey the orders of the Libyan coastguard. For the first time in months, no NGO ship is operating in the Mediterranean. Two NGO vessels docked in Malta have been detained by the authorities and prevented from leaving to carry out operations.
The Italian deputy prime minister, Luigi Di Maio, a member of the Five Star Movement, said the deaths should not to be used as evidence to dispute the government’s tough new migration policy. “We will supply motor launches to Libya because the healthiest thing is that the Libyans should carry out the rescues, and take [the migrants] back to the Libyan coast,” he said.
The Italian policy changes have increased the numbers of people put in Libyan detention camps, which have been widely criticised by human rights groups and by UN agencies.
Matteo Salvini, the Italian interior minister and driving force behind the policy, has denied claims that the Libyan detention camps are overcrowded prisons, saying he has visited a detention centre there and found the conditions acceptable.
But the IOM’s Belbeisi said: “Migrants returned by the coastguard should not automatically be transferred to detention. We are deeply concerned that the detention centres will yet again be overcrowded and that living conditions will deteriorate with the recent influx of migrants.”
The UN says up to 10,000 people are being held in detention camps.
At a briefing on Monday, a European commission spokeswoman said ships and boats flying the European flag and making rescues at sea could not bring migrants back to Libya.
“It is against our values, international law and European law,” Natasha Bertaud said. “We are well aware of the inhumane situation for many migrants in Libya. The UN is working to improve their conditions and there is an emergency transit mechanism to evacuate these people from Libya.”
The IOM director-general, William Lacy Swing, will return to Tripoli this week to see first hand the conditions faced by rescued migrants and those returned to shore by the coastguard.
The overall numbers reaching Italy are still below last year, but the Italian populist government faces a problem of dealing with a backlog of more than 500,000 people whose asylum cases have not been processed.
So far, the EU’s main proposal to prevent migrants reaching Europe – setting up asylum processing centres outside Europe – has been rejected by leaders in Albania, Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia. But the EU has yet to apply any serious pressure on these states, which are heavily dependent on EU aid.
More than 200 migrants have drowned at sea in the Mediterranean in the past three days, taking the death toll for the year to more than 1,000 and prompting fears that human traffickers are taking greater risks because of a crackdown imposed by the Italian government and the Libyan coastguard.
The UN refugee agency in Tripoli reported on Monday that 276 refugees and migrants were disembarked in the Libyan capital on Monday, including 16 survivors of a boat carrying 130 people, of whom 114 were still missing at sea. Further shipwrecks were found at the weekend.
On Tuesday the Libyan coastguard reported a further seven deaths and a further 123 migrants rescued.
The 1,000 deaths landmark was reached on 1 July. It is the fourth year in succession that more than 1,000 migrants have died trying to reach Europevia the Mediterranean Sea.
Othman Belbeisi, the chief of mission in Libya at the International Organization for Migration (IOM), claimed the “alarming increase” in deaths at sea was out of the ordinary.
“Smugglers are exploiting the desperation of migrants to leave before there are further crackdowns on Mediterranean crossings by Europe,” he said.
Overall the number of migrants reaching Italy by sea is down on last year’s figures, but the proportion of those trying to reach Italy that are drowning is rising, prompting claims that the stricter Italian government policy is to blame.
Figures prepared by Matteo Villa, a research fellow at the Italian thinktank ISPI, show that so far in 2018 only half of those leaving Libya have made it to Europe, down from 86% last year.
The data shows 44% have been brought back by the Libyan coastguard, compared with 12% last year. A total of 4.5% died or had gone missing, compared with 2.3% last year. But in June, almost one in 10 died or went missing upon departure from the Libyan coast – the highest proportion ever.
The Libyan coastguard has returned about 10,000 people to shore this year, according to the IOM. That trend is likely to continue due to three changes of policy by the new Italian government. It has closed the country’s ports to NGO rescue ships; agreed to send an extra 10 motor launches and two ships, dinghies, equipment, and vehicles to help Libyan coastguard; and extended the search and rescue area for which the Libyan coastguard is responsible, therefore reducing the area in which the NGOs and EU ships have responsibility.
The EU has also reinforced its direction to the NGOs to obey the orders of the Libyan coastguard. For the first time in months, no NGO ship is operating in the Mediterranean. Two NGO vessels docked in Malta have been detained by the authorities and prevented from leaving to carry out operations.
The Italian deputy prime minister, Luigi Di Maio, a member of the Five Star Movement, said the deaths should not to be used as evidence to dispute the government’s tough new migration policy. “We will supply motor launches to Libya because the healthiest thing is that the Libyans should carry out the rescues, and take [the migrants] back to the Libyan coast,” he said.
The Italian policy changes have increased the numbers of people put in Libyan detention camps, which have been widely criticised by human rights groups and by UN agencies.
Matteo Salvini, the Italian interior minister and driving force behind the policy, has denied claims that the Libyan detention camps are overcrowded prisons, saying he has visited a detention centre there and found the conditions acceptable.
But the IOM’s Belbeisi said: “Migrants returned by the coastguard should not automatically be transferred to detention. We are deeply concerned that the detention centres will yet again be overcrowded and that living conditions will deteriorate with the recent influx of migrants.”
The UN says up to 10,000 people are being held in detention camps.
At a briefing on Monday, a European commission spokeswoman said ships and boats flying the European flag and making rescues at sea could not bring migrants back to Libya.
“It is against our values, international law and European law,” Natasha Bertaud said. “We are well aware of the inhumane situation for many migrants in Libya. The UN is working to improve their conditions and there is an emergency transit mechanism to evacuate these people from Libya.”
The IOM director-general, William Lacy Swing, will return to Tripoli this week to see first hand the conditions faced by rescued migrants and those returned to shore by the coastguard.
The overall numbers reaching Italy are still below last year, but the Italian populist government faces a problem of dealing with a backlog of more than 500,000 people whose asylum cases have not been processed.
So far, the EU’s main proposal to prevent migrants reaching Europe – setting up asylum processing centres outside Europe – has been rejected by leaders in Albania, Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia. But the EU has yet to apply any serious pressure on these states, which are heavily dependent on EU aid.
DMorgan
You niggas is EXCOMMUNICADO!!!
This is a wild situation to navigate. If these countries government's are not going to do anything for the refugees or illegals and they out here just setting up camps on the streets and got shit looking filthy. I can see why people complain about that shit and say they don't want those people coming into their country.
At the same time can't say that you as a person and country have all this compassion for people then don't want to actually help them when they show up on your doorstep. Looking for all that compassion and help you always talking about.
Also they may not have personally done it but most of these european countries fucked those African nations up with colonialism. So part of the reason those countries are fucked up in the first place is because of the shit those countries did and continue to do with bullshit economic policies and so called loans given to those African nations.
I have no fucking idea on how this shit should be handled and resolved.