Why people continue to die in the Mediterranean

Almost ten years have passed since around 600 people lost their lives in two shipwrecks, on 3 and 11 October 2013 off the coast of Lampedusa.In the 11th attack, at least 60 minors lost their lives, so much so that it was defined as "the massacre of children".Since 2016, the Day of Remembrance and Reception has been established on 3 October, as a warning that such tragedies should not be repeated.

Since 2014, almost over 26,000 people have disappeared in the same way in the Mediterranean Sea while trying to reach European shores, according to the data provided by the Missing Migrants project of the World Organization for Migration (IOM).

The last massacre took place at dawn on February 26th:dozens of bodies were dragged by the waves of the stormy sea onto the beach of Steccato di Cutro, in Calabria, after the shipwreck of a fishing boat leaving from Izmir, Turkey, with over 200 people on board. Over 60 people have died of this latest shipwreck at the gates of Europe:among them many children, even a newborn.

In less than two months, since the beginning of the year, border deaths in the Mediterranean have already exceeded 220 (IOM data).Over 2,400 migrant people they disappeared in the Mediterranean in 2022:more than six deaths per day if one wanted to take an average.And these numbers only tell of confirmed deaths, it is impossible to quantify the victims of "phantom shipwrecks" which are difficult to document.

Just a few weeks ago another 13 migrants they had been swallowed from the sea off the Tunisian coast. In September 2022, a four-year-old girl died of starvation after the fishing boat on which she was traveling with her mother and 60 other people, which left Lebanon, remained in trouble for ten days, ignored by the competent maritime authorities of Greece and Malta, despite requests of help.At least in the same period another 90 people they had lost their lives after a boat capsized off the coast of Syria while trying to reach Europe.

In the face of these tragedies and in the face of the growing death toll in the Mediterranean, the latest law decree of the Italian government on immigration (1/2023) cannot help but be jarring. approved on February 23rd.The decree, to which the Council of Europe he contested the risk of violation of fundamental rights of migrants, introduced new rules for the rescue of migrants at sea carried out by NGOs, reducing the possibility of multiple rescues and introducing sanctions and administrative measures in case of violations.Just two days before the tragic shipwreck off the coast of Steccato di Cutro, the prefect of Ancona had in fact imposed twenty days of administrative detention of the Doctors Without Borders (MSF) search and rescue ship.A choice that appears unfortunate to say the least, considering that the MSF ship alone brought more than 5,700 lives to safety in less than two years of activity.Twenty days of absence from the sea could mean more deaths in the central Mediterranean.

The government's new strategy against NGOs saving lives at sea

 

If anything has changed in the last ten years, it is the presence in the Central Mediterranean of the "Civil Fleet", the civil fleet of search and rescue assets financed and managed by associations, humanitarian organisations, activists and private citizens which since 2015 have rescued thousands of migrants in difficulty.For over seven years not only the boats and sailing ships of Iuventa, Sea-Watch, Open Arms, SOS Méditerrnée, MSF, Emergency, Aita Mari, ResQ, SOS Humanity but also the aerial assets of Pilotes Volontaires and the switchboard for vessel reporting in difficulty of Alarm Phone collaborate in a collective effort of coordination and patrolling of the Central Mediterranean to save lives, filling the void left by the European Union and the member states which since 2014 have freed themselves from search and rescue commitments in international waters, in favor of border monitoring and protection activities.

Mare Nostrum, Italy's direct military and humanitarian mission between 2013 and 2014, had in fact rescued 159,362 migrants in a year of search and rescue operations in national and international waters, involving means of the Navy, the Coast Guard, the Air Force and the Financial Police.At the end of 2014, however, the wind changed.

Mare Nostrum ended on 21 October 2014 to make room for a series of subsequent military operations with border surveillance and defense objectives, leaving the Mediterranean without a coordinated and institutional search and rescue activity.

To the militarization of Europe's southern border, it coincided also the progressive criminalization of civil society actors by the governments of the Member States of the European Union.In fact, if on the one hand individual citizens, activists and humanitarian workers have been subject to criminal proceedings in recent years for having rescued and assisted migrants at the borders in Italy, Greece and France, NGOs in the Mediterranean have seen their search and rescue activities continuously hindered by administrative, legislative and legal measures, bureaucratic impediments, delays and long waits in the assignment of disembarkation ports.In our country, the latest law decree on the management of migratory flows, the "so-called" NGO decree, it is only the most recent piece of a political strategy that seems to want to hinder the documentation, search and rescue activities of NGOs in the Mediterranean.

The government's conduct on sea rescues is inhumane.Even according to international law

 

However, thousands of people continue to risk their lives to reach Europe and the presence of search and rescue assets is more necessary than ever.Migration flows they are growing;the militarization of borders it's matching to the birth of new migratory routes that are increasingly dangerous and more deadly.

The declarations of some representatives of the Italian government following the latest tragedy at sea insist on the need to "firmly combat the irregular immigration chains, in which unscrupulous smugglers operate who, in order to enrich themselves, organize these improvised journeys, with inadequate boats and in prohibitive conditions".These are the words of Minister Piantedosi, which was echoed by Prime Minister Meloni:“It is criminal to put a vessel just 20 meters long into the sea with as many as 200 people on board and with adverse weather forecasts.”

 

However, no reference is made to the political responsibilities of European governments regarding departures, to the factors and motivations that push thousands of people to put themselves in the hands of traffickers and smugglers in order to leave.In the absence of legal and safe routes, smugglers and traffickers remain the only possibility to seek salvation, and governments are responsible for this.

Extreme poverty, absence of basic services such as education and medical care, corruption and lack of professional prospects as well as gender violence, persecution, conflicts, environmental deterioration and conditions increasingly hostile to livelihood activities represent the main factors driving migration of increasingly younger generations, both from Sub-Saharan Africa and Central Asia.The absence of safe migratory alternatives, the inaccessibility to legal routes, humanitarian corridors and facilitated procedures exponentially increase the mortality of migratory routes;European governments cannot exempt themselves from this responsibility.

How to stop deaths at sea.Proposals for a different management of migratory flows

 

If in past years thousands of people attempted to reach Europe by crossing the stretch of sea between Turkey and Greece, the route in the Eastern Mediterranean is now traveled more frequently and is even more dangerous:at least 900 nautical miles from Türkiye or Lebanon to Italy, on overloaded sailing ships or fishing boats, for a journey that can last more than a week.It is the attempt of those who try to escape from countries such as Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria or Lebanon so as not to end up in Greece in closed centers with controlled access for migrants and applicants or not to be intercepted and rejected by the Greek authorities towards Turkey.In 2022 almost 16,000 people arrived in Italy via this route according to data provided by UNHCR.

The increase in migrant mortality as well as the reduction and even cancellation of the rights of migrants and asylum seekers are now the corollary of the tightening of migration policies and the outsourcing of the control of migratory flows to countries such as Turkey and Libya .

In 2017, the Italian government signed an agreement with the Libyan authorities, financed and supported by the European Union, which provides for the provision of technological assets, training and technical support to the Libyan military apparatus for the containment of the flow of migrants towards Italy.More simply, Italy and the European Union they contract Libya has the task of keeping migrants and asylum seekers in the North African country and intercepting them at sea to bring them back so that they do not arrive in Europe.The agreement has been renewed every three years since then.But at what price?

Because the parties must commit during the electoral campaign to cancel the Italy-Libya Memorandum on migrants

 

In addition to at least 44.5 million euros of European funds, which Italy provided out of its own pocket about 2 million, transited to Libyan power groups in the form of supplies and support, this agreement endorses a widespread and consolidated system of exploitation, extortion, forced labor, abuse, violence, torture and inhuman and degrading treatment against migrants and asylum seekers in Libya .Furthermore, if we consider that the close link (sometimes even kinship between the militias currently in power in Libya and the armed groups responsible for trafficking migrants has been reported and documented several times, the calls to fight against traffickers by many political exponents appear at least inconsistent.

The creation of walls and borders, the militarization and outsourcing of border control to the detriment of human rights, the criminalization of NGOs and attempts to empty the Mediterranean of those who save lives are taking its toll in lost human lives.The corpses that continue to surface on the coasts of the Mediterranean show with horror the failure of European migration policies that are collapsing in on themselves, and call for urgent change.

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