While France is willing to take in part of the displaced, Germany and Norway remind Rome that it is its responsibility to be the closest safe port
The new Italian government led by Giorgia Meloni is facing its first migration crisis with the more than 1,000 people who have been waiting for days for a safe port where they can disembark after being rescued by four NGO ships operating in the Central Mediterranean. After the Executive in Rome made it clear this week that it does not plan to take care of the immigrants saved by humanitarian ships flying the flags of other countries, urging that those nations take care of them, this Saturday there was a slight opening to the accept Italy that children and pregnant women go ashore. The strong hand against immigration was one of Meloni’s electoral promises during the campaign ahead of the elections on September 25.
The concession to the most vulnerable people, linked to the permission for two of these ships to enter Italian territorial waters, occurred after the exchange of statements with the authorities of Germany and Norway, where these ships are registered. The NGO Sos Méditerranée, whose ship ‘Ocean Viking’ has 234 displaced people on board, even asked Spain, France and Greece for help to resolve this crisis, as the situation is increasingly desperate for these people.
For the time being, only the French authorities have been willing to welcome part of the immigrants from the ‘Ocean Viking’ after they eventually land in an Italian port. “The fact that Italy is geographically the closest country to that ship does not mean that she should be left alone,” said French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin. With a diplomatic tone, the member of the French Executive was sure that Rome was going to comply with international law, which is “very clear” in stating that when a ship with shipwrecked people on board asks for help, “the nearest safe port must welcome them.” , in this specific case, Italy.
Norway, the flag nation of the ‘Ocean Viking’ and the ‘Geo Barents’ chartered by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), also appealed to international maritime legislation to remind us that it must be Italy that resolves this crisis. “Norway has no responsibility in reference to human rights conventions or the law of the sea with people embarked on private Norwegian-flagged ships,” the Scandinavian country’s embassy in Rome wrote in a note, stressing that responsibility would lie with Libya. . Being an unsafe nation, it would be up to the border states, that is, Italy and Malta, to intervene.
Oslo’s position is taken one day after Germany, the flag country of the humanitarian ship ‘Humanity 1’, which carries 179 immigrants on board, and of the ‘Rise Above’, with 95, asked the authorities in Rome to “urgently” take care of these people. The EU has also reminded Italy and Malta of their responsibility towards the thousand survivors who are waiting for a safe port where they can go ashore. “Saving lives at sea is a moral duty and is a legal obligation under international law of Member States regardless of the circumstances,” said Anitta Hipper, spokesperson for the European Commission. Despite these words, the EU has not succeeded in making the system work successfully to redistribute migrants arriving in Italy, Spain, Greece and Malta throughout Europe. Nine of the Twenty-seven countries, moreover, have not adhered to this program. These are Poland, Hungary, Austria, Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Sweden.
As their fate is debated in European capitals, the more than 1,000 migrants aboard the ‘Ocean Viking’, the ‘Geo Barents’, the ‘Humanity 1’ and the ‘Rise Above’ face increasingly harsh conditions. “They urgently need a safe port. His health is getting worse and due to the cold of the night the fever is spreading on board, ”the lifeguards of the ‘Humanity 1’ denounced. On the MSF ‘Geo Barents’, the situation is also desperate for the 572 people on board, including three pregnant women and more than 60 minors, many of them unaccompanied. Some were saved more than a week ago.
water rationing
“We have had to ration shower water for the first time,” warned Candida Lobes, from MSF, recalling that many of these migrants suffered abuse of all kinds for months in Libya before being able to embark for Europe. “The only thing they immediately need is to disembark in a port where they feel safe,” she claimed. Sos Méditerranée expressed itself along the same lines: it advocated a smooth operation of the relocation of immigrants between the various EU countries so that the problem does not weigh only on Italy and Malta, although recalling that this issue “is not the responsibility” of the NGO.
Despite the controversy surrounding the humanitarian boats, only a small part of the arrivals in Italy take place by means of these boats. They are around 16%, according to data from the Rome Ministry of the Interior, which reports that so far in 2022, 87,370 displaced persons have landed in Italy through the central Mediterranean, compared to 54,373 in the same period in 2021 and 29,569 of 2020.
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