“I saved a lot of people, but my friends are not among them”: MSF’s experience rescuing people in the Mediterranean Sea while denouncing inactivity by European states
“Everyone was shouting my name. Since I am from Togo, a country in West Africa, they called me: Togolese, Togolese! (…) I saved a lot of people, but my friends are not among them. Everyone drowned,” is part of the testimony of Yaovi, name changed to protect his identity. A 17-year-old boy who managed to help a four-month-old baby before Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) was able to locate and rescue people in distress in a rubber boat in the Mediterranean Sea on July 6.
“I saved a lot of babies, but one was already dead. I tried to resurrect him without success,” Yaovi added. According to MSF, 30 people died that day, including eight children.
Yaovi was helped by the Geo Barents – the search and rescue ship of the humanitarian aid organization – which that day rescued 71 people from the shipwreck, some of them with burns, caused when the skin comes into contact with oil that has mixed with seawater.
The survivors of the Geo Barents had to wait almost five days to reach land, and were only allowed to disembark in the Italian city of Taranto.
Withdrawal from Europe
MSF has been carrying out search and rescue activities in the central Mediterranean since 2015. The organization’s teams in this area have assisted more than 80,000 people. Between June 2021 and May 2022, according to the foundation’s estimates, the ship carried out 47 operations, rescuing 3,138 people and recovering the bodies of another 10 people who had died at sea. In addition, MSF teams – The Geo Barents – on board carried out 6,536 consultations for primary medical care, sexual and reproductive health and mental health.
“European states are not providing a proactive and adequate search and rescue capacity, and instead reinforcing the capacity of the Libyan Coast Guard which undoubtedly supports forced returns to Libya, where detention and abuse are the norm,” said Juan Matías Gil, MSF’s head of search and rescue operations.
He explains that the organization’s presence in the central Mediterranean is “the direct result of the progressive and shameful withdrawal of the proactive naval search and rescue capability in the Mediterranean led by European states.”
According to information from the humanitarian aid organization, there are “harrowing accounts of violence against thousands of men, women, girls and boys” migrants in Libya, asylum seekers who have been returned to this country after their attempt to cross the central Mediterranean.
MSF’s medical and humanitarian teams recorded 620 acts of violence perpetrated towards or witnessed by rescued people including physical assaults, torture, enforced disappearances, abductions, arbitrary arrests and detentions mainly in Libya, but also during their often multiple interceptions and forced returns by the Libyan coastguard.
“The police, the coast guard, the army never care about us. They beat me a lot, they hit everyone. Until you fainted, until you collapsed. So many severe punishments in that country (…) Why does the European Union support these people? I said, ‘God, please help me.’ If Nigeria were safe, it would not be on this land. As I was preparing for this third time, I said ‘God, I would rather die at sea than return to the detention centres in Libya’. I cried, I cried. Then, for the third time, I got on another boat,” says a 25-year-old man from Nigeria.
According to survivors’ testimonies collected on board that MSF has systematized, 84% of the no less than 620 reported violent acts had taken place in Libya. 68% of them in the year before being rescued. A significant number of these acts occurred after they had been intercepted by the Libyan coastguard and subsequently locked up in detention centres. Survivors reported that the perpetrators were detention guard guards (34 per cent), Libyan coastguard (15 per cent), military or non-state police (11 per cent) and smugglers/traffickers (10 per cent).
“The most frequent health consequences of the violent acts recorded were related to trauma from blunt blows, burns, fractures, head trauma, injuries related to the sexual violence and mental health disorders. Others include long-term physical disabilities, pregnancies, malnutrition and chronic pain,” explains Stephanie Hofstetter, MSF’s head of medical team at Geo Barents.
According to MSF, their safe harbour requests to disembark survivors have been systematically denied or ignored by the authorities in Malta; while petitions to the Italian authorities have been increasingly delayed. “Blockades and delays at sea not only prevent rapid access to a full assessment of medical and protection needs, but also prolong the suffering of survivors, they say.
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