Le humanitarian ship ocean viking landed Friday at the military port of Toulon 230 migrants rescued in the Mediterranean, a first in France which arouses strong tensions with Italy and triggers a new debate on the subject of immigration. “Today, our country, through the voice of its leader, has given in. So this is the start, I think, of a series of NGO boats, ”lamented RN MP Marine Le Pen. For her part, the head of the Italian government, Giorgia Meloni, who had refused to welcome the ship, deplored an “aggressive, incomprehensible and unjustified” French reaction against Italy.
“The ship docked around 8:50 a.m. and people began to disembark,” Var prefect Evence Richard told a press conference. A French doctor boarded on board before the ship docked, said Méryl Sotty, spokesperson for SOS Méditerranée. “The disembarkation will start with people with particular vulnerabilities established by the French doctor, then women, children and families,” she added.
After three weeks of wandering in vain in search of a safe port in Italy, theocean viking, ambulance boat chartered by the French NGO SOS Méditerranée will dock in Toulon, “exceptionally” and under “a duty of humanity”, announced the French Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin Thursday. Once in port, he will disembark the men, women and children he had rescued off the coast of Libya and they will be immediately placed in a “waiting area”, the Interior Ministry said.
The survivors aboard theOcean Viking, including 57 children, “will not be able to leave the administrative center where we will put them and will therefore not technically be on French soil”, indicated Gérald Darmanin. Their arrival in France is particularly tense on the far right, which cried out for “laxity” through the voice of Marine Le Pen, while the left and environmentalists welcomed a “decision worthy of the values” of France.
For Marine Le Pen, humanitarian ships are “accomplices of smugglers”
” Today, our country through the voice of its leader (Emmanuel Macron, Editor’s note) has given in. So this is the start, I think, of a series of NGO boats »estimated the president of the RN group in the National Assembly, accusing these boats of being ” accomplices of smugglers ». ” The ships that bring migrants recovered at sea to safety must bring them back to their port of departure. »she added, believing that the boat should have docked in Tripoli (Libya) or possibly in Tunisia.
Libya ” should be a safe harbor since war was fought there […]Tunisia is safe, Algeria is safe »she hammered, after a ceremony to commemorate the Armistice of 1918, in Hénin-Beaumont in her constituency of Pas-de-Calais. ” It’s absolutely not Italy’s fault. »she finally declared, indicating that, in the place of the head of the Italian government Giorgia Meloni (extreme right), she would have taken the same decision to refuse to welcome the humanitarian boat.
For his part, Mr. Bardella lamented that ” France’s immigration policy is no longer decided at the Ministry of the Interior in Paris but at sea, from ships detained by far-left NGOs, ships that should be sealed because they are involved in trafficking of human beings ». ” We need a European investigation » on the links between NGOs and smugglers, he repeated to the press in Villers-Cotterêts (Aisne), where he commemorated the Armistice.
What fate for migrants?
France wants to decide “very quickly” on the fate of migrants disembarked from the humanitarian ship ocean viking, in particular by gauging within “forty-eight hours” the relevance of their asylum application, announced the French authorities. “Our objective is to very quickly initiate all the procedures which will make it possible to rule on the situation of these people”, declared Friday morning the Director General for Foreigners (DGEF) at the Ministry of the Interior, Éric Jalon, during a meeting. a press briefing.
“An interview will be organized within forty-eight working hours” with the French Office for the Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons (Ofpra) to decide on the relevance of the asylum request of these people, directed to a holiday center on the Giens peninsula in Hyères, a town east of Toulon (southern France), he added. This interview “is not intended to rule on the asylum application, but to determine whether or not it should be considered manifestly unfounded”, insisted the DGEF.
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To speed up the procedure, “Ofpra has planned to mobilize sixteen agents from this weekend who can carry out up to 90 interviews per day,” he said. “For people whose asylum application is manifestly unfounded, who pose a security risk, we will implement […] deportation procedures for them to return to their country of origin,” warned Éric Jalon. To this end, “contacts have already been made with the countries of declared nationalities, to initiate identification and recognition procedures”, he continued, praising the “requirement of dignity and ‘humanity’, but also of the government’s ‘security, rigor and firmness’.This “phase” of checks and interviews “will probably last several days”, for his part indicated the prefect of Var Evence Richard, explaining during the same press conference that the center of the peninsula “has destined to remain open for twenty days.
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Two-thirds of the people will not stay in France anyway, since they will be relocated to nine countries, the ministry said, citing Germany which is to welcome around 80, Luxembourg, Bulgaria, Romania, Croatia, Lithuania, Malta, Portugal and Ireland. Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin sharply criticized Italy’s new far-right government for refusing to open its ports toocean viking, while maritime law obliged him to do so: “Italy was very inhumane. »
He announced the suspension “with immediate effect” of the planned reception of 3,500 migrants currently in Italy and promised to draw “the consequences” on the other aspects of his “bilateral relationship”. For its part, SOS Méditerranée said it felt “a relief tinged with bitterness. “The survivors lived through a real ordeal,” the director of the NGO, Sophie Beau, told Agence France-Presse. Three of the 234 migrants on the ship had to be evacuated to Corsica on Thursday for medical reasons.
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Italy under pressure
On board, the news of the landing had aroused scenes of jubilation, confided a photographer on board with SOS Méditerranée, evoking hugs, songs and tears of joy among these people, some of whom come from Eritrea, Syria or Sudan. South. It is “urgent that European states put in place a permanent distribution mechanism”, pleaded once again Sophie Beau, while Italy is increasing its anti-migrant declarations. “Europe must further increase the pressure on the Italian government to compel it to respect its commitments,” said Delphine Rouilleault, who heads the France Terre d’Asile association.
The head of the Italian government, Giorgia Meloni, denounced Friday an “aggressive, incomprehensible and unjustified” French reaction, recalling that her country has welcomed nearly 90,000 migrants this year while the European countries which had pledged to help her and to take care of 8,000 people had finally taken in only 117. Giorgia Meloni assured that she wanted to find “a European solution”. “It’s not smart to argue with France, Spain, Greece, Malta or other countries. I want to seek a common solution,” she stressed.
Since June, a relocation system, which had already undergone a first phase in 2019, provides for a dozen Member States, including France and Germany, to voluntarily welcome 8,000 migrants arriving in so-called ” front line” like Italy. However, only 117 have been relocated under the mechanism adopted in June. An insufficient number, judges Italy.
Since the beginning of the year, 1,891 migrants have disappeared in the Mediterranean, trying to reach Europe, including 1,337 in the central Mediterranean, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).