Amnesty International: EU must launch humanitarian operation to save lives now

‘Unless a fully-fledged rescue operation is launched, the EU would have failed to save lives’ – Amnesty International acting director McGowan • Frontex proposes to step up air surveillance immediately

Funeral march organised by Amnesty International outside the European Council building
Funeral march organised by Amnesty International outside the European Council building

The draft Council conclusions have been lambasted by Amnesty International as “a failure” by the EU in its commitment to save lives.

Some two hours before the arrival of the EU leaders in Brussels, Amnesty International held a funeral march in solidarity with the 700 refugees who lost their lives on Saturday night in the Mediterranean.

Speaking to MaltaToday, acting director Iverna McGowan said Amnesty was “very concerned” over the proposal to double the funding to Frontex, the EU’s border surveillance agency. However, it does not carry out the search and rescue operations which is what is needed to stop the hundreds of lives which are being lost in the Mediterranean.

“If this is what is decided, it will be a failure on the EU’s part in its commitment to save lives,” she said. Amnesty International has presented “a blueprint for action” to end refugee and migrant deaths in the Mediterranean.

“We have done a very thorough analysis of what is exactly needed in terms of assets and where they need to be deployed ,” McGowan said.

Amnesty International has called on European governments to urgently launch a multi-country humanitarian operation mandated to save lives at sea in the Mediterranean, deploying naval and aerial resources at a scale commensurate with foreseeable departure trends and which should patrol the high seas along the main migration routes.

“Until this humanitarian operation is in place, European governments should provide Italy and Malta with financial and/or logistical support enabling them to step up their search and rescue capacity,” the blueprint reads.

“The European Commission should support and call on European governments to launch a concerted humanitarian operation mandated to save lives at sea. The European Agenda on Migration, to be launched in May 2015 to ensure a ‘holistic approach’ to addressing migration to Europe, must include such a call and provide for safe and regular routes to Europe for refugees.”

Amnesty also proposes that, to reduce the numbers of those taking the sea crossing, European governments should increase the number of resettlement places, humanitarian admissions and visas for people in need of international protection and ensure that refugees have effective access to asylum at land borders.

According to McGowan if the EU leaders once again fail to implement an operation at par with Mare Nostrum, the European Union would have failed to save lives.

McGowan said reports pointing towards a resettlement figure of 5,000 migrants was “a disgracefully low figure”, reminding that 3.9 million Syrian refugees alone were displaced.

“We need to see a dramatic increase in resettlement figures and we need to be very clear that the attention cannot be detracted from the purpose which is the setting up of a humanitarian operation to save lives. We need to see a decision that leads to a swift implementation of a fully-fledged rescue operation,” McGowan said, asked what she thought about plans to target smugglers.

Meanwhile, Frontex executive director Fabrice Leggeri said the agency was looking forward to implement the conclusions of the European Council and  has already started preparing the implementation of the Home Affairs/Foreign Affairs Council’s proposals.

“My proposal is to increase as an immediate step air surveillance in the Mediterranean Sea south of Italy and Malta in addition to the vessels currently deployed, which is aimed at enhancing search and rescue capacities in the area,” Leggeri said.

Leggeri has suggested increasing the aerial assets taking part in the Frontex-coordinated Triton operation also following two incidents when people smugglers have used weapons to reclaim boats following search and rescue operations in which vessels taking part in Triton were involved. 

“Assets co-funded by the agency have helped save thousands of lives in the Mediterranean. Frontex will continue within its mandate to do everything it can to fulfil this responsibility,” Leggeri said.