29 women and children intercepted at gunpoint before being rescued by the Geo Barents
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The Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) team on board the Geo Barents, the organisation’s rescue ship in the central Mediterranean, witnessed another tragedy yesterday morning as they prepared to rescue a group of people in distress from a deflating rubber raft. Near the boat, armed men were on a speedboat. Survivors said 29 people, including women and children, were intercepted at gunpoint before MSF arrived.
Armed men threatened the people on board the rubber boat and fired into the air, forcing more than 70 people to jump into the water. The MSF team rescued all of them, but the boat sailed away with the 29 women and children on board.
This aggressive and irresponsible behavior in international waters by armed men, who claimed to be from the Libyan Coast Guard during a radio communication with the Geo Barents, is unacceptable. The lives of many people have been put at risk and families have been brutally separated.
83 rescued men and boys are now in desperate straits on board the Geo Barents as their loved ones have been forcibly returned to Libya.
Before the rescue, another vessel, whose crew claimed to be from the Libyan Coast Guard, asked the Geo Barents to rescue the sinking rubber dinghy. They said they would allow MSF boats to transfer the women and children, but the armed men on board the dinghy did not follow these instructions.
MSF contacted the Libyan coordination centre on land but, after lengthy negotiations, the situation has not changed.
Survivors are anguished and deeply concerned about the fate of their women and minor relatives, who were beaten and taken away at gunpoint and will once again face the cycle of violence, detention, abuse and extortion.
After carrying out this rescue in international waters, the Geo Barents is now heading towards Brindisi, the place of safety designated by the Italian authorities.
