Alarm Phone Press Release: The EU kills Refugees, Ferries not Frontex!
Press
Release, 19.4.2015
Press release also in Arabic,
French, German, Italian, Spanish, Tigrinya, Dutch
Last
night at least 650 people drowned about 73 nautical miles north of
the Libyan coast when seeking to reach Italy. They were on board of a
30 meter long boat that capsized when the container vessel King Jacob
approached them for assistance. There were only 28 survivors.
This
is the biggest refugee boat catastrophe in the recent history of the
Mediterranean Sea. With its decision from the 27th of August 2014 to
scale down rescue operations at sea, the EU is responsible for this
mass dying. The EU has the means and possibilities to rescue refugees
in the Mediterranean Sea. But instead, they let people drown.
Over
the last weeks, we, as the Watch The Med Alarm Phone, became direct
witnesses of struggles over life and death on these boats and of the
relatives’ worries. We also witnessed how the coastguards of Italy
and Malta as well as the crews of commercial vessels made great
efforts but could often not prevent the dying as they were not
sufficiently equipped to conduct rescue operations. And this is due
to political decisions made on the level of the European
Union.
Fortress Europe has caused ten thousands of deaths in
the Mediterranean Sea in the last 25 years.
Those
responsible are:
Politicians and police forces that have
created, through the Schengen Regime, the general visa-duty and the
organised manhunt of refugees and migrants without visas;
The
politicians, police and military forces that have established Frontex
in the past 10 years and have turned the Mediterranean Sea between
Libya and Italy since the Arab Spring into a maritime high security
zone;
The EU politicians who decided on the 27th of
August 2014 in Brussels to scale down the Italian rescue operation
Mare Nostrum in the Mediterranean Sea and enforced a politics of
deterrence through Frontex’s Triton operation along the Italian
coast!
They carry responsibility for the thousands of deaths
that have occurred in the last months in the maritime zone between
Libya and Italy.
The dying needs to end:
We
demand an immediately created direct ferry line for refugees from
Tripoli and other places in Northern Africa to Europe.
We
demand safe and legal corridors for refugees to reach a place of
refuge without the need to risk their lives.
We call
out, beyond all confessions and political sides, to take immediate
direct action against these murderous EU policies and
politics.
Watch the Med Alarm
Phone
http://www.watchthemed.net/
info@watchthemed.net
Last update: 07:40 Apr 21, 2015