“Those who qualify can disembark, we take care of anything that presents welfare and humanitarian problems without derogating from the fact that the obligations of taking charge are the responsibility of the flag State”. This was stated by the Minister of the Interior Matteo Piantedosi in Milan, to the Provincial Committee for Public Order and Security in the Prefecture, speaking of the four NGO ships with migrants on board that are off the Sicilian coast. “The others must go back out of the territorial waters and the flag State must take care of them,” he added. We will be firm on this principle without failing to fulfill our humanitarian obligations on which we will never back down ”.
«The competent bodies – added the minister – will ascertain who is in vulnerable conditions and we will take care of these regardless of the international rules that we believe to be clear. After that the ship should leave national waters with all the rest of the cargo. ‘
The line adopted by the Interior Ministry has led to an acceleration of checks at sea: in the next few hours, on the basis of the provisions of the new decree, an inspection by the Italian authorities on the Humanity 1 ship of the NGO ‘Sos Humanity’ is scheduled. During the inspection the conditions of the 179 shipwrecked on board will be checked, to identify fragile women and children, who will be disembarked. Following the ship, with people on board who will not be disembarked, it will then have to leave Italian waters in an appropriate time. In the meantime, the Interior Ministry intends to initiate discussions with European countries such as France, which in the past few hours have expressed their willingness to welcome a quota of migrants.
The situation off the coast of Sicily
Four NGO ships are stationed in front of the coast of eastern Sicily, waiting for a safe harbor to disembark the migrants rescued in the Mediterranean Sea. These are the German Humanity 1 (with 179 people on board) and Rise Above (90 people) and the Norwegian Ocean Viking (234 people) and Geo Barents (572). According to the signals of the transponders emitted by the ships, currently the Geo Barents and the Humanity 1 are about 12 miles from the Catania coast, the first a little further south and the other north of the city.
In the night between 4 and 5 November they would have moved closer to the coast to protect themselves from a violent storm that struck eastern Sicily, but then they returned to the “waiting” position. The Ocean Viking, on the other hand, is always in front of the Catania coast, near Acireale, and does not seem to have left international waters. Finally, La Rise Above is located in front of the Ionian coast of Messina, further north of Taormina, a short distance from the coasts of Sicily and Calabria.