SOS Humanity condemns Italy taking refugees to Albania

  ROME - SOS Humanity, a charitable organisation which conducts search and rescue missions in the Mediterranean, has condemned the Italian Navy for taking migrants to reception centres in Albania rather that Italy. This comes as a new deal between Italy and Albania was struck to allow for the processing of migrants in Albania, albeit under Italian law. 

 SOS Humanity has released a statement which strongly criticises that these migrants’ asylum applications will be dealt with in a fast-track procedure outside the EU, posing a significant threat to their human rights.  

 Political expert at SOS Humanity, Mirka Schäfer, has suggested that the Italy-Albania agreement violates international law and risks eroding the rights of refugees. She accuses the EU of using the scheme to “outsource migration management and thereby shift away responsibility for the human rights of refugees.” 

 This view is shared by the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights as well as other human rights organisations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. The deal is also said to violate maritime law. Ms Schäfer said that “the deal violates the international obligation to disembark survivors at the nearest place of safety. The Albanian port of Shengjin is around 1,000 kilometres away from the rescue area, which means several additional days of transit compared to a disembarkation in Lampedusa or Sicily. This represents an extra risk for the health and well-being of survivors.” 

 SOS Humanity demands that the agreement should be terminated as it endangers the fundamental and human rights of refugees and undermines their right to asylum. They are calling for the European Commission to examine whether this new form of outsourcing asylum procedures by Italy is a violation of EU law and the international obligations of EU member states. 

 tjpw