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483 drown in the Mediterranean while rescue ships are trapped in port | Care4Calais
On 2 July, the Sea Watch-3, which was by then the only operating
rescue boat still operating in the Mediterranean, was detained in Malta,
alongside Lifeline, and not allowed to leave port.
While rescue ships have been blocked in port, recent days have become
the deadliest in the Mediterranean this year. On 1 July, the Libyan
coastguard reported 63 people missing, while on 29 June more than 100 people drowned, among them three babies and other children. On 19 June, a wooden boat capsized off the coast of Libya. Out of the estimated 100 passengers, only five survived. A number of bodies have been washed up on the beaches.
At least 483 people have drowned in the Mediterranean between 19 June
and 4 July 2018 while two well equipped and ready to sail NGO vessels
were detained in port. These latest fatalities have pushed the death
toll in the Central Mediterranean route to over 1,400 in 2018.
One month later and Sea Watch and other rescue vessels are still being detained.
In the three years that Sea Watch has been active they have saved
37,000 people. That’s over a thousand people each month. In the middle of summer, with three ships ready to operate, they could have saved many many more than a thousand people. And that’s just Sea Watch, that’s not even counting the other rescue ships that would be out there if they weren’t prevented.
Who are these thousands of people who died because rescue missions were prevented last month? What if we could give them a name? Well over 33 per day, over 1 per hour.
What if we added to that all the ones that could have been saved if risking your life to request asylum wasn’t necessary at all? Deaths that could have been prevented. Future deaths that can be prevented if rescue missions are allowed to resume or safe passage for all it granted.
A lot of events and protests to call for the right to rescue are coming up, you can find some here:
In a cynical and wholly political manouvre, the maritime flag of the NGO SOS MEDITERRANEE will be revoked. Under pressure from Italy, Panama has now declared its decision of revoking its flag – after SOS MED has conducted rescues in the Mediterranean for more than two and a half years. Most recently, they rescued dozens of people in distress yesterday, after the Alarm Phone had alerted them to a distress case off the coast of Libya. They are still searching for a safe harbour to disembark the rescued. If they cannot go out at sea, more people will drown and no witnesses will be present anymore.
They are trying to prevent civilians from saving refugee lives at sea, and to prevent the mass-murder in the Mediterranean from even being witnessed.
And what do states do when they think there are no witnesses?
Morocco’s navy on Tuesday fired on a boat carrying migrants
Killed by the Moroccan Navy for seemingly intending to ‘illegally’ cross a maritime border to Europe. Morocco’s navy on Tuesday fired on a boat carrying migrants which refused to respond to its orders. Four migrants were wounded, including a Moroccan woman who died of her injuries in hospital.
On 25-09-2018, ONE DAY after the last NGO active in the same region was taken off the water.
More news: on 24-09-2018 Pilotes Volontaires spotted a rubber boat with about 100 people in
distress. They decided to alert the
vessels in this area. One commercial vessel and one military ship copied the mayday relay, but did nothing. Two cargo ships ignored the alert.
This shows that the political situation in the EU has an effect on ship masters, who would otherwise show no hesitation to assist people in distress at sea. No ship wants to risk losing their right to travel on international waters because they rescued refugees
and no commercial company would allow one of their captains to do so.
By criminalizing the rescue of refugees, the EU is giving ships the choice between ‘ignore refugees while they die’ and ‘risk losing your right to be at sea and your source of income’.
For the first time in months there is a positive development!
There is no news yet as to whether this ship will be able to remain active and whether rescued refugees will be able to land at a safe port, but for now it is amazing to have rescuers at sea again.
A little good news for a change
Thanks to @queeranarchism for compling such an accurate news report.
Some of it was on my post about Mayor Mimmo Lucano, but some of this I didn’t catch either.
I just want to remind everybody of the crowdfunding to repay the loan used to buy and kit out the Mare Jonio.
The importance of the work done by ONGs cannot be stressed enough. Sunday on Sky News Italia they were saying that since last year (when the government started to hinder the search and rescue work of the NGOs) arrivals in Italy have decreased by 80%, but the death toll has risen by 130%.
Exactly!
Seawatch saved
37,000 lives in the last 3 years, Iuventa saved 14,000 lives in the last 2 years. And there were more ships with rescue numbers like that. When there ships are prevented from doing their work, thousands die every day who could have been rescued.
By the way , each of these ships also have individual websites with individual
donation options. Not a penny of that is wasted. Even ships stuck in the
port need money to maintain their ship, feed their crew and direct all
their energy towards getting back on the sea.
But back to the dying. To make those numbers even more clear:
Until May this year, 1 to 2% of all refugees trying to cross the Mediterranean
died at sea, so 1 of every 50 to 1 of every 100 refugees died.
With refugee ships being prevented from doing their work, that number has risen to 19%, so currently almost 1 in every 5 refugees
trying to cross the Mediterranean dies.
QueerAnarchism 