Boat carrying more than 600 asylum seekers has refused entry by Italy

[David48atTD]

Asylum seekers on board the SOS Mediterranee ship Aquarius after being rescued by the Italian Navy, Coast Guard, and merchant ships.

Italy has refused to allow a humanitarian ship carrying more than 600 migrants and refugees to dock at its ports, officials say, and has now asked the Mediterranean island of Malta to open its doors to the vessel.

Key points

• Italy's Government faces test of election promise to stop asylum seekers
• More than 600,000 asylum seekers have reached Italy by boat since 2013
• UN estimates that at least 500 have died crossing the Mediterranean Sea in 2018

Malta brushed off the request, saying it had nothing to do with the rescue operation, opening the prospect of a diplomatic rift between the two European Union allies.



More than 600,000 migrants and refugees have reached Italy by boat from Africa in the past five years.

[birding]

Another report says the ship picked them up 'off the Libyan coast' and took then all the way to Italy.

Fair enough for these do-gooders to save lives but take them back to Libya, giving them a free ride to Europe only encourages more to have a go.

[Troy]

Send them to Israel, a country created for refugees...

[Dragonfly94]

Sink the fuker, these boats are no better than people trafficking taxi's, it's a business. They are not refugees but illegal immigrants who need to be turned back, nobody wants them, nobody needs them. Start sinking them and they will soon stop. If they do get into Europe give them what we would get in Africa- sod all.

[jabir]

Should piss off the EU gods, Italy will be smited.

[HermantheGerman]

Send them to Israel, a country created for refugees...

Send them to Britain, Home Sweet Home !

It might come as a surprise to you that new genetic evidence suggests that the oldest human remains ever to be found in Britain belonged to a dark-skinned, blue-eyed man with dark, curly hair.

https://science.howstuffworks.com/li...-age-crush.htm

[harrybarracuda]

I thought the EU were paying Italy to shut up and take them?

[OhOh]

Send them to Israel, a country created for refugees...

Or France, or all those EU countries on the Adriatic's Eastern side, whatever there called these days and there is always all the newly EU'd Eastern European countries recently "granted" EU status. Surely it was part of the entry deal, no?

it's a business.

Too right, think of all those 18+ children with no papers, whose to know, certainly not the Germans Immigration Service, who don't seem too bothered.

I thought the EU were paying Italy to shut up and take them?

Not enough it seems.

[OhOh]

France to accept Syrian refugees amid surge in anti-immigration politics


"France is set to welcome 500 Syrian refugees, reports say, at a time when what many call an anti-immigrant, far-right National Front Party is making strides in local elections and popularity polls — a sign Arab and Muslim community advocates say has grim portents for France's immigrants.


Philippe Leclerc, the French representative for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, told French newspaper Le Figaro Wednesday that President Francois Hollande agreed to accept the Syrian immigrants, after requests from the United Nations that European nations help alleviate the toll massive inflows of refugees have taken on Syria's Middle Eastern neighbors."

France to Accept Syrian Refugees | Al Jazeera America

It's not clear who determined they were Syrians, the newspaper, the French or the boats captain.

I suppose it's turn up at a border with no papers, say the word "Syrian" and the golden gates open. Do Syrians have a number tattooed on their arm? Do boat captains have an UN database connected app, to confirm nationality, prior to boarding for the cruise to heaven? Or are they just interested in bums on planks?

[Cujo]

Another report says the ship picked them up 'off the Libyan coast' and took then all the way to Italy.

Fair enough for these do-gooders to save lives but take them back to Libya, giving them a free ride to Europe only encourages more to have a go.

I agree completely.

[jabir]

Bit of a route from Syria to Italy via Libya.

[OhOh]

Some numbers:

it seems 1,040,000 arrived in Greece and Italy circa 2015. "Most likely", due to western instigated/supported/backed wars in Syria, Africa and Libya.

According to the info some 35,000 have been taken in by EU countries. leaving the rump of 1.0 million still in Greece and Italy, along with 53,000 new arrivals. Awaiting EU countries resettlement.



When will the EU countries who signed up/were told that they must take the foreigners, actually deliver on their promises? Other than Sweden, none seem to be anywhere even to meet 50%.

[Dragonfly94]

Bollocks, almost all are sub Saharan Africans from areas with no war at all who pay about £1000 quid to traffickers to get to the land of benefits and handouts

[OhOh]

almost all are sub Saharan Africans from areas with no war at all

Care to explain why ameristan, France, Germany and Italy have troops/military bases in "sub-Saharan Africa"?

[David48atTD]

Related story to the OP ...

---

Asylum seeker rescue ship captain arrested after ramming into border police motorboat


Sea-Watch 3 captain Carola Rackete

The captain of a humanitarian rescue ship has been arrested after ramming her vessel into an Italian border police motorboat while docking at a tiny Mediterranean island in defiance of Italy's anti-migrant interior minister.

Key points:

• 40 African people had been on board the ship for more than two weeks
• Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini called the captain's actions an "act of war"
• France, Germany, Luxembourg, Finland and Portugal have agreed to take the migrants

The captain steered her vessel toward the island before dawn, ramming the much smaller police boat, which was blocking Sea-Watch 3's path to the dock.
Mr Salvini slammed the captain's defiance, branding her actions as tantamount to an "act of war."

"She tries to sink a patrol boat of the financial police with agents on board at night in Lampedusa," he said.
"The great thing is that they say 'let's save lives'. And they risked killing human beings who were doing their job and the videos are obvious.

The 40 asylum seekers aboard Ms Rackete's ship, the Sea-Watch 3, had been rescued from an unseaworthy vessel launched by Libya-based human traffickers.


Here

[fishlocker]

Pink Floyd should fund "The Wall."

[fishlocker]

Maybe she can plead self defense as her cargo threatened to eat her alive.

[Troy]

She's a brave girl, Caola Rackete, left with little option but to force the police boat to move. I don't think the boat was touched, let alone rammed, just forced to get out of the way.

[David48atTD]

She's a brave girl, Caola Rackete, left with little option but to force the police boat to move. I don't think the boat was touched, let alone rammed, just forced to get out of the way.

Troy, no disrespect but one option would have rescued them from the unseaworthy vessel launched by Libya-based human traffickers and returned them, safe and sound to the port of departure in Africa.

[raycarey]

I don't think the boat was touched, let alone rammed, just forced to get out of the way.

would love to see video of this alleged crash. wouldn't be surprised if this is just xenophobes riling up anti-immigrant hysteria. there is a very evident pattern of who traffics in this sort of thing..on TD and in the media.

[David48atTD]

Further ...

The European Court of Human Rights ruled on Tuesday against an appeal from the captain of the migrant rescue ship Sea-Watch 3 to have an emergency decree allowing 42 migrants stranded on the ship to disembark in Italy.

[Jack meoff]

Did Ray make it ashore?

[raycarey]

^




good one!

no, really.

your clever wit astounds us all.

[Troy]

Troy, no disrespect but one option would have rescued them from the unseaworthy vessel launched by Libya-based human traffickers and returned them, safe and sound to the port of departure in Africa.

That is not an option for any of the humanitarian organisations saving people off the shores of Libya. Plenty of websites explaining why none will return them to the dangers of Libya.

I guess sea-watch3 will be seized and no longer be available for these rescues.

[Cujo]

Libya was once a stable if imperfect, country.
The countries responsible for upsetting that situation should be responsible for the fallout.