Spain rescues 300 migrants; Italy’s policy attacked
MILAN, Italy — Spain’s Maritime Rescue Service says that nearly 300 African migrants have been rescued in two days trying to reach Europe’s southernmost shores, including three men who had spent the night at sea on a kayak.
Nearly 100 migrants from the kayak and two boats were taken to the southern Spanish port of Algeciras, a spokesman from the service who wasn’t authorized to be quoted by name told The Associated Press.
A third boat with water leaks carrying 56 Africans was rescued Saturday by a patrol boat in waters farther east into the Mediterranean, the spokesman said.
On Friday, the service rescued some 140 people.
Most of those seeking new lives in Europe away from violence or poverty at home chose the risky Western Mediterranean route into Spain last year, but flows have recently slowed down. According to the country’s Interior Ministry, 10,475 people have arrived by sea in the first half of 2019, almost 4,000 less than in the same period of 2018.
Germany’s interior minister is appealing to his Italian counterpart to rethink Italy’s policy of closing the country’s harbors to humanitarian groups’ rescue ships.
News agency dpa reported that Horst Seehofer wrote Saturday to Italy’s Matteo Salvini that ships with rescued people aboard can’t be left to drift in the Mediterranean Sea for weeks because they can’t find a harbor. He added: “I appeal urgently to you to reconsider your position that you don’t want to open Italian ports.”
Seehofer said that, because of Europe’s responsibility “and our common Christian values,” it shouldn’t make a difference by what organization migrants have been rescued, where the crew comes from and what flag the ship is sailing under.
An Italian rescue ship with 46 migrants onboard has been docked without incident in the Italian port of Lampedusa against an explicit ban after declaring a state of emergency.
Salvini pointed to an offer from Malta to accept the migrants from the Italianflagged ship.