A boat carrying 40 migrants was “illegally transferred into Tunisian territorial waters” after being refused entry into both Malta and Italy, an NGO has alleged.
Migrants aboard the boat, including two pregnant women, remain stuck at sea with Tunisia having also refused to take them in, NGO WatchTheMed, which runs migrant sea rescue hotline Alarm Phone, said.
The NGO said it had information that “strongly suggest” the migrant vessel was moved into Tunisian territorial waters from international waters inside Malta’s Search and Rescue zone.
People aboard the wooden boat were rescued on Friday by a supply vessel named Sarost 5, the NGO said, which asked Malta and Italy for permission to disembark the rescued people.
Both countries are alleged to have refused, and the supply vessel then headed to an oil platform to be fed. Tunisian authorities in both Sfax and Zarzis have allegedly also refused to take in the migrants.
The NGO has said that the migrants remain "in limbo", five days after they were first rescued.
In a statement, WatchtheMed demanded that European coastguards “take responsibility for coordinating Search and Rescue operations of boats in situations of distress in their Search and Rescue zones, as legally mandated.”
It also declared solidarity with crews aboard NGO-run and commercial vessels which rescued people at sea “despite the obstacles that European governments create.”
The NGO's claims suggest that yet another vessel has been caught in the middle of an ongoing migration policy dispute between Malta and Italy, which was kicked off last month by Italy's new government claiming NGOs are operating a "taxi service" for asylum seekers and that Malta is not pulling its weight when it comes to sea rescues.
Malta has strongly denied that claim and insisted that it always abides by international maritime law.
A key problem is that Italy and Malta interpret international law differently: while Malta recognises an international convention which requires people rescued at sea to be taken to the nearest place of safety, Italy implements an amended version of the convention which states that people must be taken to a port belonging to the country whose Search and Rescue area they were rescued in.