Geneva — Shot on return, or left to drift
The extreme dangers for migrants and refugees trying to reach Europe via north Africa and the Central Mediterranean were underlined this week. Libyan authorities shot dead three Sudanese asylum seekers on 27 July as they attempted to flee after being intercepted at sea and returned to the country by the EU-backed Libyan Coast Guard. And in two separate incidents, boats carrying close to 100 asylum seekers and migrants were left to drift for more than a day as both Libyan and Maltese authorities failed to respond to distress calls - a recurring pattern since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. After a private merchant vessel also refused to help one of the stranded boats, Maltese authorities eventually rescued one and the Italian Coast Guard the other. At least 232 people are known to have died or gone missing in the Central Mediterranean so far this year, although the true number is almost certainly higher. Meanwhile, at least 1,750 people died - many of them in Libya - between 2018 and 2019 while undertaking journeys from East and West Africa to the Mediterranean coast, making the migration route one of the deadliest in the world, according to a new report from the UN's refugee agency and the Danish Refugee Council. Keep an eye out for upcoming TNH articles on the surge in disappearances of people returned to Libya and on the fledgling legal bids to sue the EU for assisting human rights abuses in the country.
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