In the Mediterranean, two ships having rescued nearly 330 migrants authorized to disembark in Sicily

Published on : 12/24/2021 – 9:38 PM

Two humanitarian ships which rescued nearly 330 migrants in the Mediterranean have been authorized to disembark in Sicily, the NGOs Sea-Eye and SOS Méditerranée announced on Friday, December 24, which charter these boats.

The Sea-Eye 4 landed 214 people in the Sicilian port of Pozzallo. “All have tested negative for the coronavirus,” said a spokesperson for the German NGO.

The ship had rescued 223 people in waters under Maltese responsibility during four operations, on December 16 and 17. Nine people had to be evacuated for medical reasons pending the assignment of a reception port.

For its part, the Ocean Viking had not yet disembarked at the end of the day on Friday but had obtained the green light to do so: “The Italian maritime authorities informed us that we would be authorized to disembark at Trapani, in Sicily”, Marseille-based NGO SOS Méditerranée tweeted, expressing “immense relief on board”.

On Thursday, she asked for a safe harbor to disembark in the face of “signs of fatigue, exhaustion and anxiety” among those rescued and the “permanent cold and humidity” on the boat.

23,000 dead or missing since 2014

The Ocean Viking, chartered by SOS Méditerranée in partnership with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), rescued 114 people on December 16, including minors and two newborns who were were on an inflatable boat in distress in international waters off Libya.

Despite persistent insecurity, Libya remains an important crossing point for tens of thousands of migrants each year seeking to reach Europe via the Italian coast, 300 km away.

According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), nearly 23,000 people have died or are missing in the Mediterranean since 2014, after trying to reach Europe, including nearly 1,700 since early 2021.

NGO ships save lives, but are also accused of playing the game of smugglers off Libya, where human traffickers no longer invest in ocean-going vessels capable of reaching the Italian coast and are content inflatable boats, which they overload with migrants and from which they sometimes recover the engine once the limit of Libyan territorial waters has been crossed, leaving a migrant with a telephone number to call for help.

With AFP