After days of dithering, the Ocean Viking has found a safe harbor. Thursday, the Ministry of the Interior announced the support in Toulon of the ship which transports 234 migrants who tried to cross the Mediterranean, and that Italy had refused to welcome on its coasts. A refusal which aroused the anger of France, referring its neighbor to its responsibilities, and to maritime law. But what exactly does the law say about the reception of shipwrecked people at sea?
States required to rescue and disembark shipwrecked persons
It is the closest States that must take care of it. Several texts frame this principle of rescue at sea: the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the Convention on Maritime Search and Rescue (SAR) of 1979, as well as the International Convention for the Safety of Human Life in (SOLAS) of 1974. In addition to these texts, there are a host of treaties, protocols and agreements, signed at European or United Nations level. The message is always the same: governments must have search centers at sea to carry out rescues and provide assistance to anyone in need.
“When informed that a person is in distress at sea, in an area where a Party ensures the general coordination of search and rescue operations, the responsible authorities of that Party shall take the necessary measures as a matter of urgency to provide all possible assistance”, specifies for example the 1979 Convention. Regardless of the origin of the shipwrecked, the authorities must carry out these rescues “without taking into account the nationality or the status of this person, or the circumstances in which this person was found,” reads the text.
The rescue only ends when the castaways are brought to a safe place, recalls the High Commissioner for Refugees. This is where the shoe pinches: which state should take care of welcoming refugees? In principle, “primary responsibility rests with the State responsible for the search and rescue region in which the rescue operation took place”, explains the UNHCR. This responsibility was reinforced by amendments in 2004 to the SAR and SOLAS Conventions.
But in practice, “States do not always agree” on the disembarkation of rescued people and “their subsequent follow-up”. Because by letting a foreign person disembark on its shores, a State also becomes the one that takes care of their asylum application. This is what Italy refuses, yet a signatory to the sea rescue protocols. With the arrival of its far-right Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, it intends to toughen its immigration policy and limit entries.
Italy faces sanctions
When he requested assistance, the Ocean Viking was off the coast of Italy. Legally, therefore, it was up to Rome to act. “International law is very clear”, had supported last Friday the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin: “When a boat asks to dock with shipwrecked people on board, it is the safest, nearest port which must to welcome it, in this case Italy. »
By failing to comply with this legal obligation to help, Italy could expose itself to sanctions. Meetings at European level are soon scheduled to discuss it, announced Gérald Darmanin on Thursday. Italy could also be sued by returned migrants. In 2012, the country was condemned by the European Court of Human Rights after the expulsion, in 2009, of Somalis and Eritreans at sea. An act which violated not only maritime law but also, and above all, the Convention European Union of Human Rights, recall the United Nations.
The reception of migrants in question
With this crisis, it is also the European policy for welcoming migrants that is at the heart of the debate. Italy is at the forefront of arrivals from Libya. Since June, a relocation system still provides for a dozen member states of the European Union, including France and Germany, to voluntarily welcome 8,000 migrants who have arrived in countries like Italy. Only 164 migrants were relocated in 2022 from Italy to other member states, including 117 under the mechanism adopted in June. Insufficient, for Italy, which has 88,100 migrants arriving on its coasts since January 1, of which only 14% via humanitarian ships.
Aware of Rome’s migration policy, SOS Méditerranée has asked, in addition to Italy, Spain, Malta, France and Greece to find a solution. After days of debates between Paris and Rome, it was therefore finally France which agreed, Thursday noon, to welcome the ship to Toulon, after weeks of wanderings and an emergency landing of three migrants in Bastia, in Corsica, for medical reasons. But this support, recalls the French government, remains “exceptional”.