Rayhan Ahmed Topader :
EU leaders have been accused of ‘killing migrants through neglect’ after cutting rescue missions in the Mediterranean. The mission change has led to far more deaths at sea. The EU policy- makers have been accused of “killing by neglect” by reducing search and rescue missions in the Mediterranean potentially costing the lives of over 1,500 migrants. Mare Nostrum, the Italy-led rescue mission, was scrapped in October 2014 and replaced by Triton, which deployed fewer ships and prioritised deterring migrants over rescue operations, a report by academics said. But as the conflicts in Syria and Libya deepened, migrants continued to resort to people smugglers who packed them on to dinghies and sent them across the sea.
More than 1,500 people died trying to cross the sea in the Months after the Italian-led search and rescue mission, Mare Nostrum, ended in October 2014.
It was replaced by the European force, Triton, which deployed fewer ships and made deterring migrants a priority over rescue operations. Documents unearthed by UK universities showed the European border force Frontex pushed ahead with the change despite an internal assessment warning that if it was not properly planned it would likely result in a higher number of fatalities. Over 1,500 people died trying to cross the sea in the months after the change was implemented. The number of refugees crossing the Med in the first four months of 2014 and 2015 stayed the same at 26,000, but death rates soared.
Sixty died in the first four months in 2014, but 1,687 died in the same four months the following year, meaning the chances of dying at sea increased 30-fold. Can we really qualify the ending of Mare Nostrum and its replacement by Triton in all knowledge of the consequences this would have, as a mistake?
I would rather argue that this was a case of institutionalized willful neglect, and that European policymakers and Frontex have made themselves guilty of killing by omission. Simply arguing that it was a mistake is insufficient. This effectively shifted the burden on to merchant ships that were not equipped well enough to cope, the Death By Rescue report states.
And if, as we show, policymakers and European agencies decided to disregard the risk their policy would entail for migrants, they should be held accountable for that negligence. Co-author Charles Heller, said that policy-makers ignored warnings of increased deaths and were guilty of ‘institutionalized willful neglect’.
He has called for an inquiry into why the policy was not scrapped.
