Ben Cowles
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ITALY’S far-right Interior Minister Matteo Salvini is refusing to allow 115 migrants to disembark from an Italian coastguard ship currently docked in Sicily.
Last Thursday, on the same day over 150 people were feared to have drowned in the deadliest shipwreck in the Mediterranean this year, Italian patrol boats rescued another 140 people from two dinghies.
They were later transferred to the much larger Italian coastguard ship the Bruno Gregoretti.
On Saturday night the ship was given permission to dock at the Sicilian port of Augusta. But Mr Salvini forbade it from disembarking the migrants “until Europe commits to accept all the immigrants on board.”
Ten people have since been evacuated on medical grounds, while yesterday evening authorities allowed all unaccompanied children to come ashore. Some 115 migrants and some of the crew still remain on board.
The European Commission said yesterday that it had begun contacting member states to see which were willing to take the migrants in. So far only Germany has declared its willingness to take any.
Italy’s far-right populist coalition government has spent much of the summer attempting to criminalise migrant rescues by civil society groups.
SOS Mediterranee, a French NGO which is resuming rescue operations next week with Doctors Without Borders, said: “Maritime Law must prevail over any other consideration. The 131 people rescued by the Gregoretti must be allowed to disembark as soon as possible and not after another unnecessary standoff.”
