An Italian humanitarian group whose boat was not allowed to dock in Lampedusa said the health of the 54 migrants it rescued at sea is rapidly deteriorating.
Mediterranea Saving Humans said Friday in a tweet that its sailing boat ALEX was off Italy’s southernmost island of Lampedusa, just outside Italian territorial waters, and that it has been banned from entering Italian jurisdiction by ministerial decree, the Associated Press (AP) reported.
It has urged that the migrants, rescued from a rubber dinghy Thursday off Libya, be allowed transfer to Italian or Maltese patrol boats taking into consideration their condition.
For its part, Malta said Thursday that it will take the migrants in a deal with Italy to take an equal number already in Malta.
The deal appears aimed at avoiding what would be the 21st standoff between Italy’s populist government and humanitarian groups rescuing migrants at sea.
In a tweet, the group said that “due to the psychophysical conditions of the people on board and the characteristics of the ship” it was not able to make the journey to Malta.
“But we could transfer the shipwrecked to Maltese or Italian patrol boats,” it added.
In a further tweet, the group’s spokeswoman Alessandra Sciurba wrote: “Unfortunately there’s no boat arriving from Malta to transfer the 54 migrants.”
According to AP, the NGO said the ministerial decree is illegitimate because it can’t be applied to a ship carrying people rescued at sea, and because Italy can’t ban an Italian-flagged ship from entering its waters.
Italy has insisted that the Libyan coast guard intervene and the migrants be taken back to Libya. It also argues that the presence of the ships encourages smugglers and that Italy has been unfairly stuck with the burden of managing arrivals from northern Africa for the rest of Europe.
