Sant'Egidio call for solidarity over migrant "massacres"

Flowers have been thrown into the sea to honour the migrants lost at sea
The Community of Sant’Egidio responded to the recent massacres occurring on migrant boats sailing to mainland Europe, urging authorities to correct their mistakes and open borders on humanitarian grounds. 
 
“It is painful to say that Europe and the entire international community have not managed to prevent the ongoing massacre of families in the Mediterranean” said a representative from the Christian movement. The association also asked that Europe’s leaders not fight over how many immigrants should be accepted into their respective countries, or even build walls to prevent an influx of migrants but must help to ensure that the death toll of migrants lost at sea does not “appear more and more like that of a war.” The migrants’ only crime, according to the group, is that they were born in a country ravaged by violence and hunger. 
 
“Daily death reports like these should not become commonplace” said a press release from the community, in reference to a series of migrant ships where those desperate to cross the sea were forced into the hold of poorly-equipped vessels and suffocated as a result. On Wednesday 51 bodies were found by a Swedish rescue team in the hold of one boat, the migrants presumably being suffocated by the carbon monoxide from the boat fumes. The association has called European authorities to stop these treacherous journeys ending with a death count by opening “humanitarian channels” from Africa and from the Middle East, to ensure migrants reach Europe safely. It also asks that permits be given for humanitarian reasons, as many of the migrants are fleeing from conflicts in Africa and the Middle East, particularly Syria. 
 
Community of Sant’Egidio also believes that attacking at the roots of the issue that is the wars causing the mass exodus, is the only long-term solution to the ongoing crisis: “it is necessary to increase, by all means at our disposal, the number of negotiations made to reach some form of treaty- on the condition that it is based on peace- in the warring countries.” To do this, the Christian association calls upon the international community, starting from those most involved in the wars.  In this way, the association are stressing that the migrants are not causing the crisis, but the wars which have left them no choice but to leave.