Veterinarians and Red Cross workers refused to leave Catania, Sicily, after a humanity 1 ferry abandons a humanitarian migrant rescue ship

CATANIA, Sicily — The captain of a charity-run migrant rescue ship refused Italian orders to leave a Sicilian port Sunday after authorities refused to let 35 of the migrants on his ship disembark — part of directives by Italy’s new far-right-led government targeting foreign-flagged rescue ships.

The Humanity 1 had to abandon the port of Catania after disembarking more than a hundred people, including children and some with medical emergencies.

The captain refused to allow the survivors to disembark until they had been plucked from the sea. The vessel remained moored at the port with 35 migrants on board.

On Sunday, a second charity ship arrived in Sicily, and Doctors Without Borders had already begun vetting the migrants on top of the one who had just arrived. The selection was completed by late evening, with 357 allowed off but 215 people blocked on board.

The first group to leave the ship were families. One man cradling a baby expressed his gratitude, saying “Thank you, Geo Barents, thank you,” as he left. Another man in a wheelchair was carried down by Red Cross workers.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/11/06/1134653669/italy-giorgia-meloni-migrant-rescue-ships

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Humanitarian groups, human rights activists, and two Italians protested the selection process as illegal and inhumane. Italy’s new Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi is targeting non-governmental organizations, which Italy has long accused of encouraging people trafficking in the central Mediterranean Sea. The groups deny the claim.

The Italian lawmaker made an emotional appeal to let everyone go from the Humanity 1 rescue ship.

“They have faced a lot of trauma, they have faced everything that we can define asProlonged Suffering,” said Soumahoro, who spent the night on the ship.

He said that Meloni was playing politics at the expense of babies, women, and people who have suffered traumas of all kinds.

He said neither translators nor psychologists were on hand during Italy’s selection process and many of the migrants were from Gambia, unable to speak French, English or Italian.

It is their fault to speak another language. The Italian government is accused of using the migrants to distract from other issues, including high energy prices.

Aboard the Humanity 1, doctors in Italy identified people needing urgent medical care after the ship’s doctor refused to make a selection, said SOS Humanity spokesman Wasil Schauseil. Thirty-six people were declared non-vulnerable and were not permitted to disembark, prompting one to collapse and be taken away by an ambulance.

Doctors Without Borders emphasized that “a rescue operation is considered complete only when all of the survivors have been disembarked in a safe place.”

Two other charity ships carrying rescued migrants remained stuck at sea, with people sleeping on floors and decks and spreading respiratory infections and scabies as food and medical supplies drew low.

The crew of the Rise Above, which was carrying 93 people rescued at sea, had not been in contact with Italian authorities, according to spokeswoman Hermine Poschmann.

The Ocean Viking, operated by the European charity SOS Mediteranee, with 234 migrants on board, remained in international waters, south of the Strait of Messina, and got no instructions to proceed to an Italian port, a spokesman said Sunday. The first rescue was 16 days ago.

“Agitation is evident among the survivors,” a charity worker named Morgane told The Associated Press on Sunday. Cases of seasickness were soaring after high waves tossed the ship through the night.

The weather deteriorated today, with strong winds, rough seas and rain on deck. … She said that these extreme conditions added suffering.

The diplomatic crisis between France and Italy after the ocean viking dock docking incident on Saturday night: a sharp blow to the European Union

The law of the sea obligates NGOs to rescue people in distress and coastal nations are obligated to provide safe ports as soon as possible, they say.

Italy expects other EU member states to take responsibility for people who seek asylum, but this does not justify imposing measures that only raise the pain of already traumatised people.

There was a diplomatic crisis between France and Italy on Friday when a ship carrying more than 200 migrants docked in a French port.

In a statement, French group SOS Mediterranée, which operates the ship, called the incident “a dramatic failure from all the European states, which have violated maritime law in an unprecedented manner.”

International law requires the survivors of a search and rescue operation to be transported to the nearest and safest sea harbor, according to an immigration specialist. When it comes to people coming from Africa and Libya, he says it’s always Italy and not France.

Italy’s new prime minister thanked France for accepting the Ocean Viking, when it had not yet done so.

French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin slammed Italy, saying the country had not met its humanitarian obligations. He called Italy’s refusal to accept the migrants “incomprehensible” and said there would be “severe consequences” for relations with Italy.

The decision of France to accept the migrants Friday was an “exceptional” one that will not guide further action, according to Darmanin. He said that France will put a hold on their promise to relocate 3,500 migrants from Italy over the next year.

The Foreign Minister of Italy Antonio Tajani said that the refusal of the Ocean Viking dock to dock sent a signal to EU nations that they have a bigger role to play in relocating migrants who arrive on Italian shores.

“It’s been an everlasting discussion for the last seven or eight years, how we can better disperse the migrants and asylum seekers in the EU,” he says. “And you have some member states — mostly Hungary and Poland — who have refused to receive any migrants or asylum seekers.”

The diplomatic rift between Paris and Rome shows no sign of abating, at a time when Europeans are increasingly nervous about immigration from Africa and the Middle East. The conditions that drive people to flee their countries are getting worse, as shown by the head of the Europe and Central Asia division of Human Rights Watch.

The number could go up. She says that it is essential for the disembarkation and relocation of migrants to be a predictable method in which they will be treated properly, their rights will be respected, and their asylum claims will be assessed.