Croton shipwreck: a European Mare Nostrum operation immediately

Rome, Feb. 26, 2023- Doctors for Human Rights (MEDU) expresses deep sorrow for the dozens of people who lost their lives in the tragic shipwreck off the coast fo Crotone in Calabria. It is not yet known exactly how many migrants were on board the wooden boat that left the Turkish coast four days ago. According to some survivors 180 people, according to others no less than 250. At the moment 80 people have been rescued while 59 bodies have been recovered including two twins just a few years old and a baby only a few months old . The people, aboard an old speedboat, were mainly from Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, fleeing conflict and autocratic regimes. It has been nearly 10 years since October 3, 2013, when a Libyan boat used to transport migrants sank a few miles off Lampedusa, killing 368 people. Meanwhile, more than 20,000 people have lost their lives on the central Mediterranean route. These numbers tell us something extremely clear. This tragedy was largely foreseeable and others will certainly follow if the European approach to policies on migration flows from Africa and Asia does not completely change. While any rigorous and non-ideological analysis of the enormous contemporary issue of migration can only recognize its extreme complexity in the face of which there are certainly no simple and resolving answers; on the other hand, the first statements of the Italian government appear unacceptable, which, far from acknowledging any kind of co-responsibility, simply launches invectives against traffickers and smugglers and reiterates the need to stop migrant departures “demanding the maximum cooperation from the states of departure and origin.” Basically the same policies that have made the Mediterranean a sea of death for the past ten years. Nor do the statements made in recent hours by the European Union, which through the voice of Commissioner Von der Leyen calls for “redoubling efforts” in implementing the current European migration policy of closing and externalizing borders that has proven to be a complete failure and that sounds a bit like a posthumous mockery for the people who lost their
lives today, appear acceptable. If national and European institutions, beyond declarations of circumstance, really intend to prevent the next slaughter in the Mediterranean, all that remains is to implement a radical overhaul of the migration management policy of the last decade.
In the immediate term, MEDU calls on the Italian government and the European Union to take charge of the activation of a vast and credible search and rescue operation at sea, a European Mare Nostrum that can guard the most critical areas of the Mediterranean and prevent further tragic shipwrecks.