The Dutch-flagged ship ‘Lifeline’ that about 230 rescued migrants on board for almost a week, finally docked in Malta on Wednesday, June 27. This development ends the dispute between Malt and Italy which refused to let the ship into one of its ports.
As the Maltese Prime Minister, Joseph Muscat said, Malta decided to accept the vessel, and now the procedures for identification, to find out the migrants’ asylum eligibility will start. Moreover, the rescued migrants will be distributed to other EU member states.
Seven countries agreed to share the burden of the migrants, Reuters reported. These countries are Italy, Ireland, France, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands and Portugal.
The ship will now be detained, and its captain will be questioned, as he did not accept to let the Libyan coastguard take the migrants. Mr. Muscat said that allowing the ship to dock in was a one-time solution.
Earlier this month, Italy pledged to no longer let charity ships bring rescued migrants in Italy, leaving the Gibraltar-flagged ‘Aquarius’ stranded at sea for days with more than 600 migrants until Spain eventually accepted them. Italy has seen more than 640,000 migrants land on its shores since 2014 and is currently sheltering 170,000.
ICS expressed its concern with respect to this decision of the Italian Government, noting serious implications for the safety of life at sea, as well as trade traffic issues throughout the Mediterranean.
International maritime guidelines say that people rescued at sea should be taken to the nearest “place of safety.”
In addition, the United Nations and other humanitarian agencies do not deem Libya “a place of safety” because they say migrants there are subject to indefinite detention, physical abuse, forced labor and extortion.
