Only a few hours after the death of around sixty people, including several children, drowned off the coast of Calabria, the Italian Interior Minister considered that the parents had acted irresponsibly.
Rescue operations continue this Tuesday, February 28 off Crotone, in Calabria, in southern Italy, where a migrant boat ran aground on Sunday morning. Leaving Turkey with between 150 and 200 people on board, the boat was shipwrecked offshore. While 82 people were rescued, at least 62 lost their lives, including young children, while others are still missing.
If, on the spot, the emotion is strong, in Rome, the government displays its compact firmness around the Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. The executive repeats that the main thing is the fight against human trafficking.
>>> Shipwreck of migrants in Italy: voices are raised to question the action of the rescue services and the authorities
Thus, the arrest of smugglers is an international problem, assures the Minister of the Interior Matteo Piantedosi who also points to the responsibility of the migrants themselves and in particular of the parents. “Despair should never justify travel conditions that endanger the lives of one’s own children“, he pleads.
Words spoken just hours after the terrible tragedy and judged to be of rare inhumanity by the 5 Star movement. The opposition is demanding explanations from the minister before the Italian parliament.
“The majority spoke of mini-cruises”
Simona Malpezzi, the president of the Democratic group in the Senate, denounces an absurd debate on the migration issue: “In the discussion on the decree against NGOs, the majority spoke of mini-cruises, of migrants who come on vacation, who seek to take a little trip at sea like that, as if it were a traveling for fun. The migration issue should stay out of the ideological debate!”, she denounced.
Humanitarian organizations are still wondering: how is it possible that a ship sank just 150 meters from the Italian coast? The inhabitants of Crotone do not want to become a new Lampedusa, this island located a hundred kilometers east of the Tunisian coast, which has become one of the first gateways to Europe for migrants arriving from Africa. North. On Monday, several stores in the city lowered their curtains in tribute to the victims of this shipwreck, while the President of Calabria declared Tuesday, February 28, a day of mourning in the region.