From the moment that the Matteo Renzi-led government announced last November that the Italian navy-run “Mare Nostrum” search-and-rescue operation in the Mediterranean was to be discontinued, there was always the fear that further and even bigger disasters were practically guaranteed.
Mare Nostrum, which cost Italy approximately €9 million per month, was replaced by "Triton", co-ordinated by the EU Frontex border agency.
Immediately, experts such as former Italian minister for integration, Congolese-born Cecile Kyenge, called the ending of Mare Nostrum a "step backwards".
Limited
She pointed out that Triton could not possibly be expected to prove as effective as Mare Nostrum because (a) it can call on only a third of Mare Nostrum’s capacity and (b) because its range of action is limited to a 30-mile zone around Italy’s coastal waters, unlike the huge areas covered by Mare Nostrum right up to the coast of
Libya
.
Mare Nostrum had been initiated by the Enrico Letta government in the immediate aftermath of the Lampedusa boat people tragedy of October 2013. The point about the small island of Lampedusa is that it is actually closer to the mainland of Tunisia (113km) than to Italy (176km).
Indeed, many of the boat people sinkings of the last two years have occurred just off the north African coast, making it all the more essential that the range of any search-and-rescue operation stretch practically all the way to north Africa. In that context, Ms Kyenge argued that Mare Nostrum had “saved the lives of over 100,000 people”.
Northern League
Italian opposition forces such as the Northern League had argued against Mare Nostrum, not only because of its heavy cost but also because they claimed it had acted as an incentive to economic migrants to make the hazardous trip across the Mediterranean, secure in the knowledge that if their boat got into trouble, they would be picked up by the Italian navy.
Organisations such as Médecins San Frontières and Amnesty International Italy strongly disagreed, with Amnesty pointing out last week that even though Mare Nostrum had been disbanded, "the numbers of desperate people seeking to make it to Europe are only going up".
Carlotta Sami, spokeswoman for the UN Refugee Agency UNHCR, said yesterday a "European [EU] Mare Nostrum" was needed, adding: "What happened today is proof that we need a European intervention here, capable of putting adequate rescue resources to work".
At the moment, the Triton operation comprises just three larger ships, two motor boats, two planes and one helicopter.
In a crisis like yesterday’s sinking, the rescue operations often rely on merchant ships, in the hope that they abide by the laws of the sea and rescue those in trouble.