Europe is seasick. It’s not the only illness it’s facing and, indeed, it’s nothing new. But by watching it continually waver cowardly on the refugee issue, everyone – including those who are attached to the idea that the old continent cannot welcome all the world’s misery – ends up feeling nauseous.
Left heart, right heart… it doesn’t matter. Following the journey of the Aquarius, one mainly feels heartache.
Unlike so many boats overloaded with migrants, the ship chartered by the French humanitarian association SOS Méditerranée will not sink. Its 609 passengers rescued off the coast of Libya will not drown. They will not join the thousands of other illegal hopefuls to Europe who have made the Mediterranean the largest maritime graveyard in the world.
Spain, under the leadership of socialist Pedro Sanchez, promised in the late afternoon to welcome them. This comes after an unbearable standoff between Italy and Malta, who refused to open their ports to the Aquarius, in disregard of European law. “It is our obligation to help avoid a humanitarian catastrophe,” the Spanish government stated simply in the late afternoon.
A few hours earlier, Italian Interior Minister, Matteo Salvini of the League (far-right), boasted about “closing the ports”: “Italy raises its head,” he wrote on Twitter. Yes, that’s where we are.
Before Spain responded to the SOS, Brussels had called on Malta and Italy to quickly resolve the fate of the Aquarius, but without threatening any sanctions. Germany, a bit more direct, reminded them of their “humanitarian responsibility.”
And France? Well, France remained silent.
