Mass murder on the Mediterranean

Comment: The anti-immigration measures taken by European countries have played into the hands of smugglers who are willing to send desperate migrants to a watery grave, says Ali Mehdi Mabrouk.
5 min read
26 Apr, 2015
Protests against the deaths of migrants have taken place at EU offices in Greece [Anadolu]
Originally, there was no water where the Mediterranean lies today.

The sea emerged over geological epochs, as continents tore apart and the Atlantic flooded in to the basin that was left in the wake of the tectonic shifts.

The sea is small, yet it was a cradle for civilisation, bridging together - while splitting apart - three continents. 

History of exchange

Over the past three millennia, the Mediterranean allowed people, goods, and ideas to flow to its shores - allowing cities, states, and civilisations to develop.

Now the Mediterranean has become a watery mass grave.

A European summit involving Europe's interior and foreign ministers, where immigration was discussed, has concluded.

The meeting would not be held if it wasn't for a massive humanitarian crisis, in which thousands of refugees have died trying to reach Europe's shores.

This week, 1,300 people died by drowning in the Mediterranean.

However, the summit failed to tackle this - and was nothing short of a disgrace that will come to haunt those ministers and their aides.

Outside the sleek glass headquarters of the European Union, which blocks the sky and the sea beyond, there was a tense, funeral-like atmosphere, as European officials refused to listen to the refugees' screams for help.

Unfortunately, the boats that carried those migrants who died in the Mediterranean did not have black boxes to record their last moments.

No one, no matter how many documentaries or news reports they watch, could see their panicked eyes as they sank into the water.
     They braved the waters out of love for life, only to meet death at sea.


They braved the waters out of love for life, only to meet death at sea.

The European leaders offered solutions that seem to be inspired by horror films. This includes preemptive raids against the points of departure for migrants.

Military strikes against traffickers were somehow deemed to be the best solution, replicating the unsuccessful war on terror and a complete disregard for the sovereignty of other nations.

There is no doubt that the trafficking rings have taken advantage of the collapse of border controls in multiple Arab nations, including Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and Syria.

Furthermore, civil wars have ravaged a number of African nations such as Mali, South Sudan, Congo and Somalia - resulting in more people in desperate need of asylum.

Counterproductive

In this context, the strict anti-immigration measures adopted by the European nations only helps the traffickers.

Despite stricter border controls in Europe, people are still as desperate to escape the poverty of their villages and towns in Africa and elsewhere. This makes it easier for the traffickers to invest in human tragedy.

The European Union ignores the real causes of clandestine immigration, which is the trinity of poverty, tyranny, and illiteracy. Unemployment, civil war, and famine are merely symptoms of the disease.

Until recently, the EU supported tyrannical regimes in North Africa and blackmailed them into becoming partners in their crackdown on "illegal immigration" - their preferred term, as it equates migration with terrorism or epidemics.

We all know that some of those regimes, in one way or another, volunteered to play the role of policeman. Others sought to blackmail the EU with the migrant card.
     If wealth doesn't come to the people, then the people will go to the wealth.


But as these regimes and their borders collapsed, tens of thousands of youths flocked outwards, including a reported 30,000 Tunisians who reached Italy's shores in 2012.

The European Union is now looking for new partners to do its dirty work - detaining, deporting, and intercepting migrants outside legal channels.

While these new partners may initially comply and deliver, their actions will achieve little over the medium and long terms.

Migrants needed

The European Union does not want to listen to the voice of reason.

Before he left his post as UN secretary-general, Kofi Annan submitted a now-famous report on the state of the European Union, which said that these economies needed millions of immigrants each year to grow.

Still, we must also admit that we bear part of the responsibility: our banal wars, the tyranny we sometimes support and perpetuate, and the corruption with which we collude, all squander resources and potential. This also pushes desperate youths to board these floating death traps.

If wealth doesn't come to the people, then the people will go to the wealth.

This is a self-evident fact that the European Union must keep in mind whenever the issue of migration is raised.

The European Union will never have zero immigration - even if they cover the entire Mediterranean with a huge net.

Nostalgia for the bygone time of impregnable forts is delusional in the globalised world, where images, voices, and ideas flow freely.

The only way to keep people immobile would be to kill them, which has essentially been the policy in recent days.

Development, peace, and freedom of movement are values that some associate with the systems that the Europeans developed. All we call for here is to implement them on the sea, as well as on the ground.

No one has declared days of mourning for the victims. The dead, this time, were buried without coffins or prayers, or even graves - yet their deaths will long continue to haunt us.

Ali Mehdi Mabrouk, a former sociology professor at the University of Tunis, is Tunisia's minister of culture.


This article is an edited translation from our Arabic edition.

Opinions expressed in this article remain those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of al-Araby al-Jadeed, its editorial board or staff.