The captain of the rescue ship ‘Humanity 1’ has disobeyed the order to set sail from the Italian port of Catania with 35 of the rescued migrants still on board after Italian authorities accepted only underage migrants and their mothers.
«At around 11:30 a.m. the ‘Humanity 1’ has been asked to leave the port of Catania with 35 survivors on board. The captain has refused this order. The Law of the Sea obliges him to take all those rescued at sea to safe harbor,» explained the German NGO SOS Humanity, owner of the ship, in a message posted on Twitter.
The organization has stressed that «survivors are entitled to an individual protection assessment and that can only be done on land. Returning these 35 people seeking protection in territorial waters back to the sea is a form of collective expulsion and is therefore illegal.» The NGO considers all migrants to be refugees.
A total of 144 migrants have disembarked from the vessel, all minors, including a newborn. They have been taken care of by Civil Protection personnel and Italian Red Cross volunteers who provided water, coffee, diapers and blankets to the new arrivals.
The measures are in line with the policy recently announced by the Italian Minister of the Interior, Matteo Piantedosi, a member of the government led by the far-right Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who had promised to tighten the national migration policy during her campaign.
Italy now allows the disembarkation of injured men, women and children, in general, but wants to hold accountable the countries where the rescue boats are registered. In the case of the ‘Humanity 1’, that country is Germany.
The Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Antonio Tajani, has called this Sunday for a solution at the European Union level to the problem of migrants arriving by boat. Speaking to ‘Il Messaggero’, Tajani explained that it is right to accept the sick, women and children, while acknowledging that the government has strengthened its identification policy.
«We cannot turn the Mediterranean into a cemetery, but we have to know who is on board, where they come from and where they were picked up,» he has indicated.
CRITICISM FROM THE OPPOSITION AND AMNESTY Amnesty International and the Italian opposition have rejected this selective reception and warned that it is a violation of international law.
«It is a violation of international law, it is a violation of the Geneva Convention on refugees,» stressed the president of Amnesty International France, Jean-Claude Samouiller in statements to RFI.
«Don’t classify people like that! On the contrary, we welcome them on the territory and facilitate the procedures if they wish to apply for asylum and after an in-depth and individual examination of each person to know whether or not they are entitled to refugee status, which depends on how they are persecuted in their own country, so that we do not send people back without having offered them to apply for asylum,» he argued.
Samouillier also recalled the situation of immigrants in Libya, which he described as «absolutely hellish»: «there is forced prostitution, rape, torture of immigrants, forced labor». «Some are in a situation of slavery and the European Union cannot be an accomplice to this indignity,» he said.
«It is absolutely necessary that the countries of the European Union respect international law and save people at sea. They cannot compromise on the right to asylum and the European Union must live up to its international commitments and the values on which Europe was founded,» he reiterated.
Also the Green Alliance and Left MP Aboubakar Soumahoro has criticized from the port of Catania itself this «selective reception». «I am outraged, you can not speculate with babies, women, children, people exhausted by fatigue, traumatized and exhausted by the cold, by what is happening,» he lamented in statements reported by the Italian news agency AGI.
The secretary general of the Democratic Party, Enrico Letta, has criticized on Twitter this «unacceptable» and «contrary to the principles of humanity and international standards» policy.
«The Government’s choice to arbitrarily distinguish who can disembark and who cannot, also seems to be devoid of any legal basis,» added the Democratic Party spokeswoman in the Chamber of Deputies, Debora Serracchiani.
«We ask Minister Piantedosi to come to the Chamber to report on the choices made for the landing of the ‘Humanity 1’ in Catania», she added. «These choices seem illegitimate, contrary to international law and unacceptable from a humanitarian point of view», she has reiterated.
Three other vessels operated by private rescue organizations and carrying rescued migrants are stopped off the eastern coast of Sicily awaiting clearance from a port. The vessels ‘Rise Above’ (95), ‘Geo Barents’ (572) and ‘Ocean Viking’ (234) are carrying a total of 901 rescued migrants.
