Boat with about 120 migrants on board coming from Tunisia, that arrived on the coasts of Sicily in March, 2012. Cremaschi/ Associated Press. All rights reserved.
For nearly three weeks 40 people who left from Libya were kept from disembarking in a safe port. They were stationed a few miles off the coast of Tunisia, in front of Zarzis. I have been in constant contact with members of the crew of the Sarost 5 – a supply vessel for the Miskar oil rig off the Tunisian coast – and people amongst the rescued, over recent weeks.
The stories told by the migrants are horrific: there are testimonies of torture, horrendous prison conditions and forced labour in Libya, and of 5 days spent drifting on sea, before the rescue took place. For three weeks they were forced to wait on a vessel unfit for so many people whilst negotiations – supposedly – took place between the EU and the Tunisian state. Despite international human rights law, and obligations under maritime law to rescue people in distress at sea, no state was willing to take them in. They were left in a vacuum of responsibility.
