Italy threatens to release refugees into EU unless help increases
Tue May 13, 2014 1:48pm GMT
By Naomi O'Leary
ROME May 13 (Reuters) - Italy threatened to allow refugees to cross its
borders into neighbouring countries on Tuesday unless the European Union
takes charge of a sea operation to manage the flow of migrants crossing in
boats from North Africa.
Interior Minister Angelino Alfano demanded more help after the Italian navy
task force 'Mare Nostrum' rescued more than 200 migrants and recovered 17
bodies when the boat carrying them sank off the Libyan coast.
"The European Union has two options: either it comes to the Mediterranean to
put the EU flag on Mare Nostrum or we will let migrants with right of asylum
leave for other countries," Alfano wrote on messaging site Twitter.
The European Commissioner for Home Affairs, Cecilia Malmstrom, did not
immediately respond to a request for comment.
With less than two weeks before European parliamentary elections,
immigration has become a hot political topic.
Italian politicians have long demanded more help from the rest of the
European Union to deal with the crisis, which disproportionately affects the
bloc's southernmost countries.
They have called for a change to rules which oblige asylum seekers to remain
in the country in which they first arrive.
Many migrants hope to travel onwards into northern European countries with
stronger economies than Italy, which has grown little in a decade and where
unemployment is near 40-year highs.
SHIPWRECK
At least 34,800 people have made the treacherous crossing from North Africa
to Europe so far this year, compared to 43,000 in all of 2013.
This puts the annual total on track to surpass the 60,000 who made the trip
in 2011 when the Arab Spring revolutions loosened border controls, according
to the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR.
Hundreds of people have died after their flimsy and overcrowded boats sank
on the route.
After the latest shipwreck on Monday, Italian naval and coast guard ships
recovered 17 bodies including those of two small children and rescued 206
survivors after the 12-metre long wooden boat they were packed into sank
some 45 miles from the Libyan coast.
The incident, which occurred outside the zone normally patrolled by Italian
vessels, followed a similar disaster off the Libyan coast on Sunday in which
at least 40 people drowned.
"This was the second shipwreck in a week," Admiral Mario Culcasi, commander
of the Mare Nostrum task force set up to deal with the crisis, told Reuters.
"They are a symptom perhaps of the difficulties that the smugglers are
facing, above all in finding seaworthy boats," he said.
Merchant ships saw the boat sink and began rescue operations while alerting
authorities in Lampedusa, the island midway between Sicily and Tunisia where
the naval task force set up to handle the migrant boat crisis is based.
The most common migrants are Eritreans fleeing hardship and army
conscription and Syrians escaping a civil war that has dragged on for three
years.
The UNHCR said it was not clear why the numbers of migrants crossing had
increased this year compared to 2013. But Egypt has become less welcoming to
Syrian refugees and European efforts to stem the tide of West African
migrants via Morocco may have diverted some to Libya.
Sophisticated marketing by people smugglers and encouragement from friends
and family who successfully make the crossing could also play a role, said
Chris Lom, spokesman for the International Organization for Migration,
warning that the numbers perishing on the journey were likely to increase.
"At this time of year, as the weather improves, you will see larger numbers
of people coming across and therefore larger numbers perishing at sea with
these unseaworthy boats." (Reporting by James Mackenzie and Naomi O'Leary in
Rome, Steve Scherer aboard an Italian navy vessel, and Tom Miles in Geneva.
Writing by Naomi O'Leary, Editing by Angus MacSwan)