Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/560195
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 23 AUGUST 2015 15 wards, out of reach: the eyes of the woman he couldn't save. The feeling is horrific. I've had similar feelings in places like Afghanistan and Iraq, when you could see the horrors of war first hand. "We connected; we understood each other. We shared the same pain of seeing death, and experiencing the helplessness of not being able to do anything about it. At the same time, however, I also know I have money. What do I do with my excess money? Reinvest it to make more money… which is what most people do? Buy nice things for myself…?" It was roughly at that time, he adds, that Pope Francis made his appeal for intervention in the Med. "Somebody had to say it. And it's a beautiful thing, too, when the head of the Catholic Church talks about the 'globalisation of indifference'. He is right; we have been indifferent to this tragedy. We have reacted as if it wasn't our problem. Why? These are human beings, and yet we're allow- ing them to die because of a border policy… or because of our inability to find legal pathways for them to seek asylum…" Indifference, he suggests, has itself become one of the more worrying aspects of the crisis. "When we hear of 40 people dying at sea, there is a tendency to look at that as just another news item. But what if 40 Maltese people died in a boat accident? How would people react? It would be a national trag- edy…" Recent history bears this argument out. Cases with far lower death tolls have been considered calamities by local standards. Just consider the Simshar tragedy, or – to give a differ- ent example of a fatal maritime ac- cident – the nine dockyard workers killed in the Um Al Faroud explosion of 1995. "I think Malta sometimes forgets that these things happen out there. The older generation which expe- rienced death, suffering and famine in World War Two… they can per- haps relate better. But the younger generation has no direct experience of this. So when it happens to your own, the reaction will be one of out- rage and alarm. But when it hap- pens to a group of black people, or Arab people... they are just seen as a number, a statistic. We want to hu- manise these people… they are our brothers and our sisters..." This raises a question regarding the role of the 'private sector' (in the broadest sense) when taking over from what, ultimately, should be the role of governments. The point was raised recently by Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, who remarked that private initiatives such as MOAS should not absolve States of the ob- ligation to fulfil one of their 'core functions'. Would he agree that MOAS is fill- ing a void created by the inability of Europe to take collective action when faced with a crisis? "Yes, absolutely, this is a void that needs to be filled by countries. But whether the governments of those countries have the political will to do that… that's the issue right now. And it's a complex issue, too. Competing political parties tend to use issues like migration to score points against each other, and this makes it impos- sible to achieve a unified response. Politics is like that, not just with im- migration. But I think all politicians would agree that we have to main- tain our humanity. Even the far right would agree to that..." Would it? Here in Malta, there are exponents of the far right who have advocated shooting boats at sea… Catrambone however suggests that there is a difference between political posturing for effect, and the decisions one takes when actually confronted with a tragedy. "Take any far right politician out there, and present him with a baby you've just rescued at sea. Would he say 'throw that baby back in the water'? No, they would never say that. Because when you see it with your own eyes… you see their faces, you hear their cries… you cry too, because when you see that sort of suffering, you feel it inside you…" This comment reminds me of the recent funeral held in Malta for 24 (out of an estimated 800) asylum seekers who drowned off Lampedusa last April. It was attended by all the relevant European politicos, who all made the right noises about the need to 'shoulder collective responsibility'. Yet to this day the same European politicians still bicker over whose responsibility it actually is, and how best to shoulder it. And all along, the death toll has continued to rise in- exorably… Catrambone nods. "MOAS is only a stopgap measure; it's clearly not enough. Yes, I agree with the Prime Minister that saving lives is a core function of the State. The European Union has an obligation to protect human rights. And it is not fulfilling that obligation by allowing people to die at sea. That much is clear…" Legal obligations, he adds, mean nothing if they exist only on paper. "The real obligation is to act; but governments can't do that because politicians can never reach an agree- ment. But we are not looking to re- lieve States of the pressure of their international obligations. If there's a contribution we can make, it would be to show governments that there are other ways the job can be done. Ultimately, all we did was refit an old fishing trawler, and use the latest technology to find and help people at sea. That could, in some way, in- fluence governments to look at how we're doing things. Maybe they could learn from us…" There is much, he adds, that Euro- pean governments might learn from the experience of private initiatives like MOAS. "Take a government, and compare it to a private organisation run by business people. We don't have to go through all the bureaucracy that governments have to. So yes, it is a more efficient and cost-effective al- ternative. Do you know how much it costs to maintain a navy vessel at sea for the purpose of rescuing migrants, as opposed to a private vessel such as the Phoenix? Probably we run at one-sixth of the cost. You don't need large navy vessels out there: you need smaller boats like ours, or the [Me- decins Sans Frontieres] boat the Ar- gos, or even the Dignity. These boats are more efficient and do the job bet- ter… you don't need to lower ladders for people to climb onto the deck of a navy destroyer, for instance… Navy ships, he adds, are not made for search and rescue, but for war. "There's also the difference be- tween operating unmanned drones – where there is no risk of a pilot dying in a crash – and manning a naval or Coast Guard helicopter. It's more cost-effective for govern- ments to learn from our experience. You don't need to deploy your en- tire naval fleet to rescue migrants; Europe doesn't have to keep break- ing the bank at every moment to send more assets out there. They can learn to use different assets that are not only more efficient, but also safer." It remains debatable, however, whether Europe is taking any of these lessons on board. Recently the Commission issued what it called a 'comprehensive plan' to tackle immigration head-on. One of the more controversial aspects of this plan involved destroying hu- man traffickers' boats. Catrambone echoes criticism by human rights NGOs that this ap- proach would only exacerbate the problem. "I think that this strategy only drives up the price for illegal smug- gling. Boats become scarcer, and therefore migrants are forced to cough up more money for the pas- sage. And they're still coming. The EU is destroying boats right now, but that hasn't stopped people from crossing the Mediterranean. The Maltese have been destroying boats for years; they were the first ones to do this, it's well known. Now the Italians are out there conducting the same exercises. This is making the journey more expensive, and just as unsafe for migrants…" What the EU's action plan over- looks, he argues, is the demand among asylum seekers. "There is a will to come. And these people know that there is a fairly high chance of dying on the way. Yet they keep coming all the same. When is Europe going to realise that we have to maintain our level of humanity? We cannot allow people to die at sea. As long as there are no legal pathways for people to come and apply for asylum, they will continue to risk their lives. Europe cannot continue to ignore that. This is after all 'The West' we are talking about here: not a third world continent, but supposedly a beacon of hope and refuge for the entire world…" Interview The Migrant Offshore Aid Station (MOAS) has rescued more than 10,000 people at sea since 2013. Is this the start of the 'privatisation' of search and rescue in the Med? Not according to founder CHRIS CATRAMBONE, who argues that European countries still have to fulfil their own obligations be managed better When we hear of 40 people dying at sea, there is a tendency to look at that as just another news item. But what if 40 Maltese people died in a boat accident? How would people react? It would be a national tragedy… PERSPECTIVE