The Libyan coastguard yesterday accused the EU of enticing migrants to their deaths as more than a hundred bodies washed up on its beaches in a single day.
An EU-backed naval flotilla – stationed in the Mediterranean to rescue migrants who attempt the crossing and then ferry them the rest of the way to Italy – has been blamed for a surge in numbers.
More than 13,000 migrants have been rescued from dangerously packed fishing boats and dinghies in the past week alone, but an estimated 1,000 have drowned.
Yesterday, at least 117 bodies, including 75 women and six children, were discovered near the city of Zuwarah in western Libya, the port that overlooks the main migrant sea route.
Authorities are uncertain when or how the people died.
But Mohammed al-Mosrati, a spokesman for Libya’s Red Crescent charity, said the bodies were not ‘decomposed and therefore have drowned within the past 48 hours’. The children found dead were between seven and ten, according Bahaa Al Kwash, another Red Crescent worker.
‘It is very painful, and the numbers are very high,’ he said, adding that the dead were not wearing life jackets – something the organisation had noticed about bodies recovered in recent weeks.
‘This is a cross-border network of smugglers and traffickers, and there is a need for an international effort to combat this phenomenon.’ Libyan coastguards found an empty boat drifting on Thursday, according to Libyan navy colonel Ayoub Gassim.
He added that it was possible the vessel had capsized a day earlier – and that the boat might have been the one carrying those who later drowned.
The EU’s Operation Sophia has ships including Britain’s HMS Enterprise patrolling just inside international waters ready to pick up those who are attempting to get to Europe.
Mirwan Issam Abudib, the deputy commander of the coastguard in Zuwarah, accused Brussels of causing the rise in the number of drownings.
‘I blame Nato and the EU for many of these deaths,’ he told The Times. ‘Their rescue ships from Operation Sophia and suchlike now push to the 12-nautical-mile limit of our territorial waters.
‘The migrants respond to this by trying to cross in greater numbers, and the smugglers respond by sending them to sea in s****ier and s****ier craft, designed to stay afloat for a few hours only.’
He added: ‘The more are drawn, the more try. The worse their craft, the more they die.’
Colonel Gassim blamed Europe for ‘doing nothing but counting bodies’ in efforts to stop the massive illegal migration from Libya.
The country has been particularly chaotic since the ousting and killing of its long-time autocratic ruler Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.
Libya has been split into rival governments and parliaments – and each is supported by a loose set of militias and tribes.
Smuggling gangs have taken advantage of the unsettled political situation to send waves of overcrowded boats toward Europe.
Aid officials said the past two weeks had been especially deadly because traffickers were using riskier tactics, bigger boats and even less seaworthy vessels than before.
Frederico Soda, who heads the International Organisation for Migration’s Mediterranean office in Rome, said the increase in those making the deadly crossing was due ‘in part, to better weather, and in part to the use of bigger wooden boats that can carry more people than the rubber boats’ that were used last year.
William Spindler, a spokesman for the UN refugee agency, noted that new and far riskier tactics were being used by people smugglers.
He said that until last week he had never heard of traffickers using an overloaded boat carrying hundreds of people to tow another vessel, packed with hundreds more, which lacked an engine.
The second boat capsized on May 26, drowning what his agency estimated was around 550 migrants.
Hadi Al Zowaghi, a Red Crescent representative in the Libyan town of Sabratha, criticized local security forces for not trying to stop the human trafficking and failing to properly document those who die.
‘These are real people – they had families,’ he said.
‘They deserve to be buried properly and their relatives deserve to be notified.’
