Spain accepts 630 rejected migrants
Italy warns it will continue turning away rescue ships
THE 630 migrants whose rescue sparked a major migration row in Europe began disembarking in Spain yesterday after a turbulent week that saw Italy turn them away.
The first of three ships transporting the group, an Italian coast guard vessel called the Datillo, pulled into Valencia harbour with 274 migrants on board.
The Aquarius itself, the rescue ship chartered by a French NGO which has been at the centre of the crisis, pulled into port some four hours later in southeastern Spain. As it neared port, those on board had danced and sang, their excitement captured in footage released on Twitter by SOS Mediterranee which operates the vessel together with Doctors Without Borders (MSF). The third boat, the Italian navy ship the Orione, was due to arrive by midday, regional authorities said.
The migrants, most of them from Africa, were welcomed by a team of more than 2 000 people, including 470 translators and 1 000 Red Cross volunteers who distributed basic items. High waves and winds had forced the naval convoy to take a detour on its 1 500km voyage to Spain, ending a weeklong odyssey in the Mediterranean.
Among the passengers are 450 men and 80 women, at least seven of them pregnant, as well as 89 adolescents and 11 children under the age of 13. They come from 26 countries, mainly from Africa but also Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan, MSF said.
The Aquarius rescued the migrants off Libya’s coast last weekend but Italy’s new populist government and Malta both refused to let it dock, accusing each other of failing to meet their humanitarian and EU commitments.
Spain eventually stepped in and agreed to receive the refugees as a political gesture to “oblige Europe to forge a common policy to a common problem,” foreign minister Josep Borrell said.
Madrid on Saturday said it had accepted an offer from France, who had angered Rome by branding it irresponsible, to welcome Aquarius migrants who meet the criteria for asylum.
The plight of the Aquarius has again highlighted the failure of EU member states to work together to deal with the influx of migrant arrivals since 2015.
After Rome’s decision to ban the Aquarius, Macron and Italian premier Giuseppe Conte met on Friday and agreed that the EU should set up asylum processing centres in Africa to prevent voyages of death.
They also demanded profound changes to the EU’s asylum rules which put the migrant burden on their port of entry to Europe, mainly Italy and Greece.
Italy’s far-right Interior Minister Matteo Salvini warned on Saturday that other NGO-operated rescue ships would also be banned from docking. “While the Aquarius is sailing towards Spain, two other Dutch NGO-operated vessels (Lifeline and Seefuchs) have arrived off the Libyan coast, to wait for their human cargos once the people smugglers abandon them,” Salvini wrote on Facebook.
“These people should know that Italy no longer wants to be any part of this business of clandestine immigration and they will have to look for other ports to go to,” he said. —