NGOs are sounding the alarm. Forty humanitarian organizations, including Save the Children and Amnesty International, on Wednesday (October 26th) urged Italy to repeal a controversial agreement signed with Libya to prevent migrant boat crossings to Europe. This call was made via a joint press release quoted in particular by the specialized media Infomigrants on its site (article in English).
Under the 2017 agreement signed with the support of the European Union, Italy contributes to the financing, training and equipment of the Libyan Coast Guard, which then intercepts migrants in the Mediterranean and returns them from force towards Libya.
“Europe, defender of human rights, must under no circumstances enter into an agreement with a country […] in which migrants are tortured, victims of slavery or sexual abuse”said Claudia Lodesani, head of Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in Italy, at a press conference in Rome.
Activists say nearly 100,000 people have been intercepted in this way in five years. Many would have ended up in Libyan detention centers, compared by Pope Francis to concentration camps. Critics deplore a lack of accountability, without transparency on the beneficiaries of European funds, while NGOs denounce a “Wild West” situation, with armed militias posing as the Libyan coast guard.
The appeal by 40 organisations, including MSF, calls for urgent action by Italy’s new far-right government, which was sworn in over the weekend. If Rome does not terminate the agreement by November 2, it will be automatically renewed for three years. In her inaugural speech to Parliament, the new President of the Italian Council Giorgia Meloni pledged on Tuesday to adopt an even tougher line on illegal immigration transiting by boat.
Italy has long been on the front line of migration, welcoming tens of thousands of people to its territory each year who attempt the deadliest crossing in the world. In response, the country had concluded numerous agreements in the 2000s with the Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi on the reduction of migratory flows.