Confusion Reigns Supreme While Migrants Die

The war on migrants is claiming ever more victims. There is no pause: the victims are increasingly younger, victims of policies arising from Europe’s choice to be ever more closed in on itself. A Europe with a constant syndrome of believing itself to be under siege, rending people’s lives a living hell, as is the case for the 606 people who arrived last Friday in Palermo on border the SOS Mediterranee, a landing baptised by all of the newspapers as the “ship of children.”

The SOS Mediterranee at the Port of Palermo

New Rejections, Arrests and Hotspots: The Migrants Italy Does Not Want to Protect But Continues to Exploit

Around 250 people in just one landing: this is the number of migrants, almost all Moroccans, who were handed rejection notices immediately after arriving in Pozzallo over a week ago on board the Golfo Azzurro. Photocopied rejection notices which impose that you leave the Italian state within seven days, via Fiumicino airport in Rome. This absurd, illegal, unconstitutional procedure has been carried out yet again, leading to the collective rejections of which Italy was found guilty by the European Court of Human Rights.

The Aquarius in port at Catania

New Landing Procedures or Simply Chaos? The Example of a “Delayed Landing” at Messina

“In aleis strenua – in pugna invicta”: “Resolute in venture, invincible in battle.” This is the motto of the Italian navy's imposing vessel the Virginio Fasan (F591), the unusually long stop-over of which at the port of Messina drew the curiosity of passers-by. It raised doubts and some confusion among the local activists, readily expressed in the press release from the Communist Refoundation Party (PRC) of Messina, who in the end “allowed” us to arrive in time to help with the last day of what had become one of the longest and most exhausting landing operations in recent history. The last group of migrants, around 150 of the total 1,159, were allowed to leave the ship by 9pm on Thursday 1st September, that is, 48 hours after the disembarking began in the late afternoon of August 30th.

New disembarkings and hundreds of rejections at Pozzallo and Lampedusa

When we visited the Hotspot at Pozzallo a few days ago, we asked repeatedly for clarification regarding the procedure for separating “economic” migrants from those seeking international protection. The officials at the Prefecture told us how, once the disembarking operation has come to an end, the refugees are transferred by bus to the centre situated a few hundred metres away, and allowed into a building through a side entrance which leads directly from the port; here there is the initial health screening, immediately followed by 'pre-identification', including the filling out of the so-called “notification paper” which inquires into the migrant's reasons for having fled from their country.

Frontex meets with the Associations in Catania

Press release

On Thursday, 14^th January, a meeting took place in the press room of the Catania police station between several associations, police representatives, Mrs Paglialunga and Mr Nicolao, the regional representative of Frontex.

Let’s reject everyone or even better, let's not!

 “If we hadn't seen it with our own eyes, it would have been difficult to believe what Italy is doing. We are producing “illegal immigrants”, and entirely consciously. A human being, one who has just arrived after a journey across the desert, Libya and the sea, has been rejected with a piece of paper whose meaning he doesn’t even understand, but which actually condemns him to irregularity since the moment of his entering the country. This is an individual who has been deprived of every possibility of a real life. Italy is following “orders” coming from Europe and doesn’t realize that the only way to move beyond this, for their sake and for its own, is to give them leave to remain, a travel document, and to let these people enter Europe with their heads held high. We should drape them in legality! Instead of throwing them onto the streets, as they've been doing around here for some months now.”