The new monitoring, search and rescue mission of the MARE JONIO ship of Mediterranea Saving Humans left yesterday evening the port of Trapani.
This is its 18th time since October 2018 for the only ship in the civil fleet flying the Italian flag.

However, this is a mission of particular importance: for the first time, the MARE JONIO is accompanied along its route by a support sailing boat organized by the MIGRANTES Foundation of the Italian Catholic Church, with the function of observation and documentation, information and testimony.

A few hours after departure, the MEDITERRANEA and MIGRANTES Mission received an extraordinary handwritten message of “fair winds”. Pope Francis, through Don Mattia Ferrari, wrote to the crews:

“I wish you the best and I send my blessing to the crews of Mediterranea Saving Humans and Migrantes. I pray for you. Thank you so much for your testimony. May the Lord bless you and Our Lady keep you. Fraternally, Francis”

The MARE JONIO ship and the MIGRANTES sailing boat will reach the SAR operations area south of Lampedusa this afternoon, Saturday 24 August. Despite the silence that seems to have fallen on the ongoing humanitarian crisis in our sea, the mission is intervening in a dramatic situation: according to data released the other day by IOM (UN International Organization for Migration), since the beginning of this year to the 17th of August, over 1,000 people have died or are missing in the Central Mediterranean, while almost 14,000 have been captured at sea and brought back to the infamous prison camps in Libya.

According to data provided by the Tunisian authorities themselves, over 30,000 people are said to have departed from Tunisia and been intercepted on land or in the water. For many of them, their fate has been deportation and abandonment in the desert. Therefore, behind the praised “reduction in landings in Italy” there is an increase in violence and suffering for people on the move and, proportionally, also in the number of lives lost compared to previous years.

This is a direct consequence of the agreements stipulated by Italian governments and European institutions with militias and regimes in Libya and Tunisia.

“In addition to the primary objective of the mission of safeguarding at all costs every single human life in danger at sea,” explains Laura Marmorale, president of MEDITERRANEA Saving Humans, “there is the prevention of interceptions and pushbacks of migrants towards 'unsafe' ports and countries, such as Libya and Tunisia, where fundamental rights are denied and the very safety of people is at risk on a daily basis. Interceptions and pushbacks that are open violations of international, humanitarian and maritime law.”

At sea Trapani / Lampedusa, August 24, 2024, 10:00 a.m.