A first. A humanitarian ship with 230 migrants on board, theocean vikingwill dock Friday in Toulon “on an exceptional basis”, announced Thursday the French government, at the end of a diplomatic standoff with Italy, an outcome which causes a new outbreak of fever between Paris and Rome.
“I made it clear, at the request of the President of the Republic, that it is on an exceptional basis that we are welcoming this boat, given the fifteen days of waiting at sea that the Italian authorities made the passengers undergo”, declared the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, designating for the landing the military port of Toulon, in the south of France.
He also criticized the “incomprehensible choice” and contrary to “international law” of Italy, led by a new far-right government, which refused to open its ports.
“A third” of the migrants on board will be “relocated” to France and another third to Germany, continued Gérald Darmanin, adding that those who do not meet the criteria for the right of residence or asylum “will be returned directly”, without further details.
If the decision to welcome for the first time an ambulance boat in France was a “duty of humanity”, according to Gérald Darmanin, the latter especially expressed the anger of Paris. “We now have to be able to organize things differently to [ne] not that Italy can both benefit from European solidarity while being selfish when refugees, especially children, show up” at its ports.
Other receptions suspended
By way of protest, France decided to suspend “with immediate effect” the planned reception of 3,500 migrants currently in Italy and promised to draw “the consequences” of the Italian attitude on the other aspects of its “bilateral relationship”, insisted the minister.
Thursday, four of the 234 migrants on the ship were evacuated to Bastia (Corsica), including three for medical reasons and one accompanying person.
The rescue operations took place at the end of the morning: an air force helicopter with a medical team took off around 11:00 a.m. from the Solenzara base, in Corsica, to pick up the patients, detailed with from AFP frigate captain Pierre-Louis Josselin, spokesman for the maritime prefecture.
At 12:15 p.m., this helicopter landed at Bastia hospital, AFP noted.
One of these patients “has been unstable and unresponsive to onboard care since October 27. The other two suffered injuries in Libya which […] now risk having negative long-term consequences”, detailed a spokeswoman for SOS Méditerranée, which charters theocean viking.
Being able to dock in Toulon is “a relief tinged with bitterness”, its director Sophie Beau told AFP. This long blockage at sea “shows the urgent need for European states to set up a lasting distribution mechanism” for migrants rescued in the Mediterranean, after having generally fled Libya on board makeshift boats.
The reception of this boat aroused the ire of the far right in France, like Marine Le Pen, who sees in it “a dramatic signal of laxity”. “With this decision, [Emmanuel Macron] can no longer make anyone believe that he wants to put an end to massive and anarchic immigration, ”wrote the president of the RN group in the National Assembly, on Twitter.
“Major turning point”
“This is a major turning point,” a source familiar with the matter told AFP, referring to “the political precedent that this creates”: “From now on, will humanitarian ships have the reflex to come to France when the Italy will close its ports? »
If the French decision is “indispensable and welcome”, because it will “make it possible to save lives”, “there will, unfortunately, be other ocean viking “, for her part estimated Delphine Rouilleault, who heads the association France land of asylum. “Europe must further increase the pressure on the Italian government to force it to respect its commitments. »
While awaiting disembarkation on Friday, theocean viking was now going up off the eastern coast of Corsica.
Before him, three other NGO boats managed to disembark the rescued migrants, some 800 people.
The Italian authorities had initially accepted only women, children and sick people, a sorting described by Rome as a means of pressure on the European Union so that it helps Italy more.
Since June, a relocation system, which had already undergone a first phase in 2019, provides for a dozen Member States, including France and Germany, to voluntarily welcome 8,000 migrants who have arrived in countries such as Italy. , close to the Libyan coast.
However, only 164 were relocated in 2022 from Italy to other Member States, including 117 under the mechanism adopted in June. An insufficient number, judges Italy, which claims that some 88,100 people have arrived on its shores since January 1.