cerca CERCA
Giovedì 28 Marzo 2024
Aggiornato: 21:21
10 ultim'ora BREAKING NEWS

'Our duty to save migrants' says Alfano

03 ottobre 2016 | 18.10
LETTURA: 2 minuti

'Our duty to save migrants' says Alfano

Europe has a moral obligation to rescue migrants, Italy's interior minister Angelino Alfano said Monday during a visit to Lampedusa, where nearly 400 migrants drowned in a shipwreck off the island three years ago.

"We don't know if people are refugees or migrants when we save them, but we know that we must rescue them," Alfano stated.

In remarks on the first National Day of Remembrance for the Victims of Immigration, Alfano urged the European Union to adopt a united approach to the migration crisis in the Mediterranean.

"Europe now has clout and a duty to intervene, without this we are all weaker," Alfano stated.

Alfano took part in a ceremony at sea aboard an Italian coastguard boat during which a wreath was thrown into the sea at the spot where the migrant boat sank on 3 October 2013 with the loss of 368 lives.

Some of the victims are still unidentified. Alfano said Itay would "carry out a technical assessment" to see which of the victims' bodies could be repatriated.

"We will need to compare DNA samples with those of family members in the victims' home countries," Alfano said.

Survivors of the shipwreck were among around 1,000 people who on Monday marched to the Gate of Europe, a five metre-high monument built in Lampedusa in 2008 and dedicated to migrants who head for Sicily in search of a better life.

'Protect people, not borders' read a banner carried by people on the march.

The Lampedusa shipwreck led EU Commissioner Jean-Claude Juncker to say "no more deaths in the Mediterranean," Lampedusa's mayor Giusi Nicolini told a workshop held on the island called 'Europe starts at Lampedusa'.

Italy has been at the front line of Europe's immigration crisis, taking in more than 450,000 migrants who have arrived by boat from North Africa since the start of 2014, official figures show.

Almost 302,500 people have crossed the Mediterranean to southern Europe this year, of whom over 132,000 have arrived in Italy and over 166,600 have reached Greece, the International Organisation for Migration said on Friday.

More than 3,500 people have drowned on the journey, of whom over 3,000 perished on the Central Mediterranean route to Italy, the IOM said.

Riproduzione riservata
© Copyright Adnkronos
Tag
Vedi anche


SEGUICI SUI SOCIAL



threads whatsapp linkedin twitter youtube facebook instagram
ora in
Prima pagina
articoli
in Evidenza