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The sinking of a packed migrant boat off the coast of Greece may be “the worst tragedy ever” in the Mediterranean sea, according to the EU Commissioner for Home Affairs Ylva Johansson.
Dozens of people were killed and hundreds more left missing when the boat, traveling from the coastal city of Tobruk in Libya to Italy, capsized off the coast of Greece earlier this week. The true toll of the disaster is yet to become clear.
“We don’t have all information yet on what has happened but it seems like this is the worst ever tragedy we’ve seen in the Mediterranean,” she told a press conference in Brussels on Friday.
The tragedy has shone a spotlight on the EU refugee crisis in which every year, tens of thousands of migrants fleeing war, persecution, climate change and poverty risk treacherous routes to Europe.
Johansson condemned the role of “smugglers” who put people on the boats. “They are not sending them to Europe, they are sending them to death. This is what they’re doing and it’s absolutely necessary to prevent it,” she said.
“Unfortunately, we have seen this coming because since the start of the year, there was a new modus operandi with these fishing boats leaving from the eastern part of Libya… and we’ve seen an increase of 600% of these departures this year,” she added, stressing the need to find “different ways to fight the smugglers and save lives.”
“When it comes to fighting the smugglers, we can’t rely on only one way to do that. We have to use intelligence – we have to use common police investigations together with countries of origin, with countries of transit, with countries of departure,” she said.
