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Updated | AFM hit back at Italian media over migrants rescue
74 migrants to return to Tunisia after agreement between Italian and Tunisian authorities. Armed Forces rebut allegations by Italian media that Malta refused to respond to distress call by migrants on the high seas.
19 March 2012, 12:00am
Karl Stagno-Navarra
Karl Stagno-Navarra
1 min read
The AFM has responded to all distress calls
An agreement has been reached between the Tunisian and Italian authorities in regards to the 74 migrants who were rescued by the Tunisian fishing-vessel Lofti on Saturday. The migrants will be taken to Tunisia aboard a Tunisian Navy vessel.
The migrants are currently on the fishing-vessel south of the Italian island of Lampedusa. The AFM said that the French-registered Tunisian fishing-vessel "Lotfi" which took aboard 74 Somali migrants from a sinking boat on Saturday, were not in distress.
The migrants were refused disembarkation by the Italian authorities, who claimed that the island was not a safe port.
The "Lotfi" rescued the migrants from a position 53 nautical miles from Tunisia, 50 NM from Lampedusa and 120NM from Malta.
In a statement which referred to a series of reports in the Italian media regarding the latest wave of migrant boats from Libya which have been intercepted close to the island of Lampedusa, the AFM said that it deployed air and sea assets in response to the calls.
It explained that an aerial surveillance aircraft was dispatched on a number of flights, as well as two patrol vessels, one to the west and the other to the south-west of Malta.
Communication channels between the Maltese authorities and other rescue coordination centres always remained open, and a series of phone calls and fax exchanges between the different centres where information was shared.
Meanwhile, 114 migrants who were rescued by the Italian Coast Guard off Lampedusa, reached the island's harbour on Saturday evening.
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Grazzi ghal-JRS u l-NGO's u l-kretini religjuzi li juzaw il-karta ta' Kristu biex jibilghu il-flus minn fuq dahrek ja iblah! Min veru jrid jighnhom lil dawn in-nies mela allura jghinhom f'darhom u johloq kummerc maghhom f'pajjizhom! Meta ser jifimha din l-elettorat? Qed thallu nies juzaw l-awtorita' u l-poter taghhom ghal-vantagg taghhom u lilek jattakkak emozzjonalment u religjozament biex tmur il-GENNA! Ja iblah!
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The first duty of the Armed Forces of Malta is to make sure that illegal immigrants do not land in Malta.
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Malta has to adopt similar solutions like other mediterranean countries - due to malta,s size we have no choice but to keep this inflow in check - and yess it has to be addressed immediately because it has become an excessive burden - too much for malta to handle.keep up the surveillance and make sure they dont enter territorial waters otherwise the burden will become overwhelming - malta is already a densely populated little island - so it has to adopt harsher measures
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This people in need,they are makeing Italian people hate ous.Is there going to be a cold war with our
neibours?
