The Aquarius, the boat humanitarian who saved him from dying drowned 30,000 people trying to get by boat to Europe, including the moroccan Miral, the cameroonian Jessica or the sudanese Mohamed, will not set sail. Doctors Without Borders and SOS Méditerranée, the NGO that is allied to fletarlo in 2016, have officially announced this Friday, the end of the mission. A final forced. The Italian Government, with its policy of preventing migrants shipwrecked landed in its territory, has won the battle. Both NGOS argue that its decision “is the result of a campaign led by the Italian Government and supported by other european States, to delegitimize, discredit, and hinder” his mission, that “undermines international law”.
The Aquarius takes two months moored in Marseille after Gibraltar and Panama will take the flag this summer and that an Italian judge opened an investigation against them by the management of the wastes on board, allegations that both NGOS reject. The Aquarius is, along the Open Arms, the more active and symbolic of the ship, against wind and tide, have maintained their mission to rescue migrants at sea. A mission in which it came to have up to a dozen ships, but a sustained campaign of harassment, political and bureaucratic, has been minándola.
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in Spite of the accusations and the seizure of some ships, any crew member or NGO has been convicted in open investigations. His absence means less rescues and less witnesses.
This year, they have irregularly entered the EU 113,000, more than half of that for Spain, according to the count of Unhcr. Despite the fact that the figure represents a significant decline, the rise of the parties ultras thanks Vevobahis to the speech antinmigrantes (the last Vox in Andalusia, southern spain) has led the EU to undertake a policy deterrent and has become the international waters between Libya, Malta and Italy in scenario of a pulse formidable among the NGOS whose priority is to save migrants shipwrecked, and the european Governments.
so far this year, 2.133 migrants have drowned in the Mediterranean while it is increasingly common that those who manage to survive have that other boats have followed the route without rescatarles although the law of the sea is clear: every captain is obliged to rescue a drowning person.
In June 629 migrants that the Aquarius had just rescue (including Miral, Jessica and Mohamed) were the first affected by the closure of the ports declared by the minister of the Interior Italian, Matteo Salvini, nothing more assume the position. Spain decided to host the group for humanitarian reasons.
But a month-to-month even Governments more open to receiving migrants shipwrecked have tightened their policies. The attempts of Spain and France to arrange a stable system to share between countries the rescued –a demand repeated by the UN and NGOS– has failed. Since Aquarius was in a state of limbo in June, there have been similar crises. Solve each one has required a remarkable political and diplomatic effort.
The last, last week, when a fishing boat rescued 12 migrants and for ten days they waited on the high seas, someone acogiese, although the law of the sea establishes that must be brought to the port nearest safe. Were landed in Malta to be transferred after to Spain.
Responsible for SOS Méditerranée, this Friday in Paris. THOMAS SAMSON AFP
The institutional pressure on the NGO rescue has been gradually increasing as the EU was stepping up to the coast guard of Libya and delegated to it despite the fact that the country is not, according to the UN, a safe country. So far this year, about 14,000 migrants en route to Europe have been intercepted by the libyan and systematically imprisoned in detention centers in deplorable conditions.
the resignation of The boat Aquarius, 77 meters long, with a crew of a dozen rescuers, a dozen toilets, and another of sailors, does not imply the waiver to take new rescues. SOS Méditerranée, founded by a captain on a merchant who in his youth was impressed by the crisis of the boat people (vietnamese people who no one wanted in the seventies), he intends to come back to rescue as soon as possible. The NGO “remains fully committed to help save lives and prepare to resume the activities of track and rescue at the beginning of 2019,” he emphasized in a note. SOS looking for a point guard and a flag that will allow it to charter a new vessel and return to international waters off Libya.
