Stop returns of migrants at sea, pope says

VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis on Sunday made a plea to end the practice of returning migrants rescued at sea to Libya and other unsafe countries where they suffer “inhumane violence.”

Francis also waded into a political debate in Europe, calling on the international community to find ways to manage the “migratory flows” in the Mediterranean.

“I express my closeness to the thousands of migrants, refugees and others in need of protection in Libya,” Francis said. “I never forget you, I hear your cries, and I pray for you.”

Even as the pontiff appealed for changes of migrant policy in his remarks to the public in St. Peter’s Square, hundreds of migrants were at sea in the central Mediterranean awaiting a port following rescue or recently coming ashore in Sicily or the Italian mainland after setting sail from Libya or Turkey, according to authorities.

“We need to stop sending back (migrants) to unsafe countries and to give priority to the saving of human lives at sea with protocols of rescue and predictable disembarking, to guarantee them dignified conditions of life, alternatives to detention, regular paths of migration and access to asylum procedures,” Francis said.

U.N. refugee agency officials and rights groups have denounced the conditions of detention centers for migrants in Libya, citing torture, rape and insufficient food. Migrants endure weeks and months of those conditions, awaiting passage in unseaworthy rubber dinghies or rickety fishing boats arranged by human traffickers.

Hours after the pope’s appeal, the humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders said that its rescue ship, Geo Barents, reached a rubber boat that was taking on water. It tweeted that “we managed to rescue all the 71 people on board.”