The UN chief and agencies serving refugees and migrants urgently called for safer travel routes and bolstered rescue operations following the deadly shipwreck that left at least 60 dead on Sunday off the coast of Crotone, Italy.
“Every person searching for a better life deserves safety and dignity,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said. “We need safe, legal routes for migrants and refugees.”
The UN refugee agency (UNCHR) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM), in a joint statement, expressed condolences for the victims and called on countries to increase resources and capabilities to effectively meet their responsibilities.
Rescue crews searched by sea and air Monday for the dozens of people believed still missing from a shipwreck off Italy’s southern coast that drove home once again the desperate and dangerous crossings of migrants seeking to reach Europe.
At least 80 people survived Sunday’s shipwreck off the Calabrian coast, but rescue crews recovered 60 bodies, including those of several children and the corpse of a young man Monday morning. Dozens more were feared dead given survivor reports that the ship, which set off from Turkey last week, had carried about 170 people.
“It is unacceptable to witness such horrors, with families and children entrusted to unseaworthy boats,” said Chiara Cardoletti, the UNHCR representative for Italy, the Holy See and San Marino.
The boat had left Turkey, with many passengers coming from Afghanistan and Pakistan. In 2022, people from Turkey accounted for around 15 percent of total arrivals by sea in Italy, the UNHCR said, noting that nearly half of the people arriving along this route were people fleeing Afghanistan.
The agencies said European Union mechanisms for rescue operations are “urgently needed.”
To avoid tragedies like this, Cardoletti said, it is “more necessary than ever before to strengthen the rescue capacity, which is still insufficient.”
Laurence Hart, director of the IOM Coordination Office for the Mediterranean, said this shipwreck demonstrates how the phenomenon of migration by sea must be tackled by all European nations.
This requires humanitarian support and adopting an approach that considers the multiple drivers that are causing people to flee, she said.
The IOM Missing Migrants Project reported that at least 220 people, including those who perished on Sunday, died or went missing along the central Mediterranean route in 2023.
Source: United News of Bangladesh