“Aurora”
German sea rescue ship arrested in Italy
Sea-Watch faces a fine of up to 10,000 euros in Italy. (icon image) photo
© Daniel Bockwoldt/dpa
“We simply had no other option than to sail to Lampedusa,” says Sea-Watch. The Italian authorities see it differently.
The Italian authorities have the German Rescue ship “Aurora” temporarily detained. As the Italian news agency Ansa reports, the coast guard is withdrawing the ship belonging to the German aid organization Sea-Watch for 20 days. The organization confirmed the transaction.
The reason given was that the ship disregarded a government decree. The crew of the 14-meter-long boat headed for the island of Lampedusa after rescuing 72 people from the Mediterranean Sea – but the authorities had previously assigned them the port of Trapani, located further away in north-western Sicily.
The sea rescuers explained that the port could not be reached due to a lack of fuel for the ship, and that the drinking water on board had run out. “We simply had no other option than to enter Lampedusa,” said Sea-Watch operations manager Rebecca Berker in a statement.
The organization also called for the immediate release of the “Aurora”. In addition to the determination, Sea-Watch faces a fine of up to 10,000 euros. The civilian sea rescuers are a thorn in the side of the right-wing Italian government led by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
A number of people keep trying to reach Italy with often unseaworthy boats from Tunisia and Libya. The highly dangerous crossings sometimes lead to devastating boat accidents. The Ministry of the Interior in Rome counted more than 105,440 people who reached Italy on boats this year – in the same period last year there were almost 50,760.