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WORLD NEWS Thursday 13 april 2023

U.N.: Year is off to a deadly start for migrants crossing Med

By FRANCES D’EMILIO
Associated Press
ROME (AP) — The first three
months of 2023 were the
deadliest first quarter in six
years for migrants crossing
the central Mediterranean
Sea in smugglers’ boats,
the U.N. migration agency
reported Wednesday, cit-
ing nations’ delays in initiat-
ing rescues as a contribut-
ing factor.
The International Organi-
zation for Migration docu-
mented 441 migrant deaths
along the dangerous sea
route between northern Af-
rica and Europe’s southern
shores during January, Feb-
ruary and March.
In 2017, 742 known deaths
were documented in the
same period, while 446
were recorded in the first A ship carrying some 700 migrants enters the Sicilian port of Catania, Wednesday, April 12, 2023.
Associated Press
three months of 2015.
“The persisting humanitar- Many deaths only come to came in six incidents in denied.
ian crisis in the central Med- light when survivors recount which “delays in state- According to the Italian
iterranean is intolerable,’’ that their vessel set out with led rescues in the Central Interior Ministry, 31,192 mi-
IOM Director General An- more passengers than the Mediterranean were a fac- grants had arrived in Italy
tonio Vitorino, commenting number who ultimately tor.” The report’s authors by sea this year as of Tues-
on the figures the agency making it to safety. lamented the “complete day.
released in a report. The International Organi- absence of response” in a The figure didn’t include
“With more than 20,000 zation for Migration said it seventh situation, in which some 700 migrants crowd-
deaths recorded on this also was investigating “sev- at least 73 migrants lost ed aboard a smugglers’
route since 2014, I fear that eral reports of invisible ship- their live. boat that apparently ran
these deaths have been wrecks” — cases in which The authors also cited a out of fuel and got towed
normalized,’’ Vitorino said. boats are reported missing, boat carrying some 400 mi- Wednesday morning to a
“States must respond. De- where there are no records grants that remained adrift port in Sicily under an Ital-
lays and gaps in state-led of survivors, remains or in the sea between Mal- ian Coast Guard escort.
SAR (search-and-rescue search-and-rescue opera- ta and Italy for two days Migrants aboard that ves-
areas) are costing human tions. before the Italian Coast sel cheered and shouted
lives.” It estimated that “the fates Guard came to its aid. “Beautiful Italy,” when they
While this year has started of more than 300 people Italy’s governments have reached Catania, Italian
out on a distressing note, aboard these vessels re- at times impounded char- state TV reported.
IOM tallied higher numbers main unclear.” ity-run boats for technical Italy for years has sought
of people dead or missing Without naming nations, reasons or, as the country’s to prod fellow European
in the Mediterranean in six the agency blasted poli- current right-wing govern- Union nations to take more
other quarters since 2017, cies aimed at complicating ment is doing now, required of the rescued migrants
with the most documented the work of rescue boats them to disembark their who step ashore in Medi-
in the second quarter of operated in the central rescued passengers farther terranean countries, many
2018, at 1,430 Mediterranean by humani- away from the southern- with the aim of finding jobs
The true number of lives lost tarian organizations. most ports that jut out into or family members in north-
among migrants who set The report cited a March 25 the Mediterranean. ern Europe.
out on smugglers’ unsea- incident in which members On Tuesday, Italy’s far-right Under current EU rules, the
worthy rubber dinghies or of the Libyan Coast Guard premier, Giorgia Meloni, country where asylum-
decrepit fishing boats is un- fired shots in the air as a and her Cabinet declared seekers first arrive is respon-
known because the bodies charity rescue boat, Ocean a six-month state of emer- sible for them.
of people who perish at sea Viking, was responding to a gency to cope with the “The situation in the Medi-
often are never recovered. report of a rubber dinghy in country’s latest increase in terranean has been a hu-
distress. migrant arrivals. manitarian crisis for over
“State efforts to save lives Among the goals of her a decade now,” IOM
must include supporting coalition, which includes spokesperson Safa Msehli
the efforts of NGO actors the stridently anti-migrant said Wednesday. “And the
to provide lifesaving as- leader of the League Party, fact that deaths continue
sistance and ending the are efforts to step repatria- on its own is very alarming,
criminalization, obstruction tion of migrants who aren’t but the fact that that’s in-
of those efforts” by humani- eligible for asylum. Many creased is extremely alarm-
tarian groups, the IOM said. of the asylum-seekers who ing because it means that
The agency’s report said reach Italy are fleeing pov- very little concrete action
the deaths of at least 127 erty not war or persecution was taken to address the
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