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IT HAS BEEN a record year for Italy’s coastguard, with nearly 180,000 people rescued in the Mediterranean, longer days than ever before and, despite their efforts, thousands of victims.
In a small room in a soulless ministry building in the south of Rome, red telephones ring and operatives juggle with maps on giant screens on the walls as they coordinate all rescue operations off Libya.
“As soon as someone calls for help, we become conductors,” directing any nearby vessels — be they coastguard, military, private or commercial — to detour to the rescue zone, spokesman Filippo Marini told AFP.
In the gloom of the operations centre, SOS calls are reduced to little more than coordinates, handled with military precision.
But the cries of desperate migrants, faces numbed by fear and hands outstretched for help as they slip off sinking dinghies, are not far off, with a video of past rescues playing on a loop on a giant screen in the corridor.
Spread up and down the 8,000 kilometres of Italian coastline, the 11,000 members of the coastguard are charged with ensuring maritime safety, protecting the ecosystem and regulating the fishing industry.
They traditionally survey an area of 500,000 square kilometres off Italy’s shores. But an underperforming coastguard in crisis-hit Libya means the Rome Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC) actually has authority over most of the international waters between both countries.
More boats, fewer phones
The seas teem with activity. Around 170,000 people were rescued from migrant boats in 2014, with another 153,000 picked up in 2015 and nearly 180,000 this year — including 4,000 just last week, despite worsening weather at sea.
And the smugglers have upped their game, sending more of their smaller boats — and dinghies rather than wooden vessels — and dispatching lots at the same time. This year saw a 40% rise in the number of boats rescued.
“The smugglers used to send bigger boats, each with a satellite phone” to call for aid, said Sergio Liardo, the centre’s head.
Now they set off four boats out with one phone.
Patrolling vessels can easily find the dinghy with the phone but have to look out for the other three, which can deflate and take water quickly. Drowning is not the only killer here: overcrowding, hypothermia or fuel burns can also finish off in a few hours people weakened by terrible conditions endured trying to get this far.
As well as the thousands of migrants lost in seconds to the waves — sometimes as the rescue crews look helplessly on — the coastguard’s near-daily press releases this year have provided a running tally of corpses discovered aboard dinghies.
Duty
The NGO-led rescue vessels patrolling the area have testified to how difficult it can be to spot a dinghy in the immense blue and regularly warn some may be sinking without a trace.
“We cannot rule that out,” Liardo admits.
And while in the past each day of calm seas would see a handful of boats set off, this year saw a series of mass departures.
More than 13,000 people were rescued in one week at the end of May, some 14,000 others in five days of good weather in August — with a record hit with 7,000 people on 53 boats picked up in one day — and 6,000 more on October 3 alone.
In Italy, where reception centres are at bursting point, the figures have stirred up a storm, with the anti-establishment Five-Star Movement and anti-immigrant Northern League insisting it is not Rome’s job to rescue foreigners off Libya and house them here.
The government says rescue ops at sea will have cost €1.5 billion this year, with an extra €2.3 billion spent on reception.
“We have a duty not to let these people die. If we ignored it, we would have to answer to the Italian justice system,” Marini said.
“It’s also a question of human kindness,” he added.
Only non-Western countries are allowed have borders it seems. Anyone who doesn’t subscribe to that belief is far right in the eyes of open border nut jobs.
https://www.google.ie/amp/s/www.express.co.uk/news/world/745789/Asylum-seeker-Somali-Koran-Austria-Oberndorf/amp Offended Somali asylum seeker storms the stage of a kindergarten Nativity play in Austria.
@Beachmaster: And then people wonder why so many Austrians were willing to vote for a man tainted with Nazi associations recently.
It’s interesting how people are red thumbing the link I posted. Is it because they feel things like this shouldn’t be reported or they agree with his actions?
Our resident Liberal apologists and keyboard Jihadists.
@Beachmaster: It’s probably because it’s a link to the Express. People tend to fall for the fallacy that the source indicates the truth or otherwise of the contents.
Next time try finding a German source and let them use google translate. Most won’t because that would be far too much effort. But those who do just might grasp that only ‘far right’ newspapers bother to translate and republish this kind of thing.
Here, I’ll help with this one:
“Ein Islamist hat auf einer Kinderweihnachtsfeier die Anwesenden in Angst und Schrecken versetzt. Bei einer Aufführung der Kleinsten stürmte er auf die Bühne und begann aus dem Koran zu predigen.”
Translation: “An Islamist made attendees at a childrens Christmas festival shocked and afraid. During a performance by the littlest ones he stormed the stage and began to preach from the Koran.”
He was Somali. Now if one knows anything about Somalia this kind of behaviour is not exactly shocking.
@Nazerene: And that too of course.
“We Came We Saw He Died” ..all this is because of this.. and What is also really amazing is the people inputting red thumbs are probably Clinton Fans
Liberals… https://youtu.be/rrBxZGWCdgs
@Jason Murphy: Not really. Most of the people on the boats aren’t Libyan. They are just using Libya as a port of embarcation.
What’s the difference between liberals and neoliberals? is it the same as the difference between nazis and neo nazis?
Our EU leaders should hang their heads in shame they have had yrs to come up wit an answer to this problem. Genuine refugees should be accepted until returning to there homes when the situation is right (if they wish),economic migrants must be made aware that will not reach Europe and that they are risking their lives for nothing
As populations are rising exponentially in places such as Asia, Africa and the Middle East there will be a corresponding rise in those claiming asylum as refugees for all sorts of reasons.
Even having legitimate refugee status has its limits as the numbers will be too great to bear in Europe and other parts of the West.
The West should not be used as a human repository just because other countries in other parts of the world have lost the run of themselves, or never did. Integration, let alone assimilation, will prove impossible. It already is for many.
@O’ Connmhaigh- good points
the slave trade is back and alive and well. over 60% of these are economic migrants, perhaps higher now that words got back to their friends behind. fully supported by the elite, the likes of george soros and co. or celeb endorsed dictators smack their exploitive lips at. will they have to deal with it? nah, thats never part of the agenda. one could easily think the media hand pick these boat pics that show just young males, no children, not women… just to stir up those against, a sort of coniving propaganda. The thing is most of them are that, young opportunist men.
“We have no duty to let them die” Ok, so why can’t you drop them back to their starting point? You are actively encouraging migrants to risk their lives crossing the Med. Blood is on your hands, just like Merkel.
One could hardly term it a rescue at this stage as most of these hundreds of thousands must be aware of the dangers. It’s more of a gambling game right now. The EU should intercept these individuals in Libya, finger print and DNA them and issue a formal warning to them about smugglers and the dangers and so on and if they are subsequently found at sea they should be sent back asap.
Either have border controls or don’t have border controls. Real democratic countries give their citizens a vote in such matters but then again we are in the PO xy EU
Liam Cunningham is going to house thousands of them in his home.
Stop with this nonsense rescue. Its a pick up service.
I think the Irish navy should help in the rescue but can’t see the refugees getting out of Italy which is already overloaded with asylum seekers None of the posts on this thread critical of the present policy would ever be allowed on RTE or Newstalk They would be seen as far right and racist
Its open season for people smugglers as European navies are providing a taxi service. The pictures are reasonably accurate, just look at all the women and children……………oh wait there are none. All I see is young military age males.
“It’s also a question of human kindness,” – Where was the human kindness for those raped and assaulted in Cologne, or for the families of those kill in terrorist attacks.
The emotionally blackmailed bleeding heart liberals have enabled all of this.
The Irish navy assisting people smugglers and encouraging those who will risk their own lives for the promise of future prosperity.
The migrants should be returned to Libya.
Simple plan:
(1) Every boat that’s stopped, all the passengers are interrogated.
(2) If they give useful information enabling a trafficker to be identified, they get preferential review for asylum.
(3) If that information is good enough to secure the capture and conviction of a trafficker, they get to stay and get €100,000 for their trouble.
(4) Everyone else gets dropped back in Libya.
(5) The boat is scuttled.
Now the traffickers have become a winning lottery ticket walking around. Greatly reduced financial incentive => less supply.
@Ben McArthur: That’s pretty clever.
Look at these poor fragile women and children in the picture, my heart bleeds we need to pump more money into bringing them in.
I agree that you have a duty. But that means encouraging them to not make that trip in the first place by showing them it’s futile. Ie: return then from whence they came.
So long as you keep bringing them to your country, you encourage them to make the dangerous trip, making you responsible for their deaths
@Techni Myoko: Exactly. The road to hell really is paved with good intentions.
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