Italy's new leaders get tough on migrants; Spain steps up

Italy's new "Italians first" government claimed victory Monday when the Spanish prime minister offered safe harbor to a private rescue ship after Italy and Malta refused to allow it permission to disembark its 629 migrant passengers in their ports.

The Aquarius, a rescue vessel operated by aid group SOS Mediterranee, has been stuck in the Mediterranean Sea since Saturday, when Italy refused its crew permission to dock and demanded that Malta do so. Malta refused on Sunday.

In this photo taken on Friday, June 1, 2018 the rescue vessel Aquarius ship approaches the Pozzallo harbor, Southern Italy. Spain stepped up Monday, June 11, 2018 and offered to take in a rescue ship carrying more than 600 migrants after Italy and Malta refused. Italy and Malta quickly thanked Spain's new Socialist prime minister for the offer to receive aid group SOS Mediterranee's ship at the port of Valencia. (AP Photo/Salvatore Cavalli)

In this photo taken on Friday, June 1, 2018 the rescue vessel Aquarius ship approaches the Pozzallo harbor, Southern Italy. Spain stepped up Monday, June 11, 2018 and offered to take in a rescue ship carrying more than 600 migrants after Italy and Malta refused. Italy and Malta quickly thanked Spain's new Socialist prime minister for the offer to receive aid group SOS Mediterranee's ship at the port of Valencia. (AP Photo/Salvatore Cavalli)

Spain's new Socialist prime minister, Pedro Sanchez stepped in Monday, ordering authorities in Valencia to prepare for the ship's arrival.

"It's our duty to avoid a humanitarian catastrophe and offer a secure port for these people," Sanchez said.

Both the ship and its passengers were caught up in a political dispute that might not have happened weeks ago.

One of the coalition partners in the populist government that took over in Italy on June 1, the right-wing League, promised voters other European Union countries would be made to share the burden of caring for asylum-seekers who set out for Europe on unseaworthy smugglers' boats.

Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini addresses the media during a press conference at the League party's headquarters in Milan, Italy, Monday, June 11, 2018. Italy and Malta dug in for a second day Monday and refused to let a rescue ship carrying 629 migrants dock in their ports, leaving the boat at sea as a diplomatic standoff escalated under Italy's new anti-immigrant government.  (AP Photo/Charlene Pele)

CORRECTS NAME OF BOAT This undated photo released by by French NGO "SOS Mediterranee" on Monday June 11, 2018 and posted on it's Twitter account, shows migrants aboard SOS Mediterranee's Aquarius ship and MSF (Doctors Without Borders) NGOs, in the Mediterranean Sea. (Kenny Karpov/SOS Mediterranee via AP)

"Evidently it pays to raise one's voice, something Italy hasn't done as long as one can remember," Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini, the League's leader, said Monday at party headquarters.

For those aboard the Aquarius, Spain's offer of docking rights at the port of Valencia was welcome news, although it did not provide a quick or easy solution. By Monday evening, the ship was more than 1,400 kilometers (over 750 nautical miles) from Valencia and still awaiting formal instructions to head to Spain as weather forecasts predicted worsening conditions.

It was unclear if the days of sailing west it would take to get to Spain were feasible, SOS Mediterranee Maritime Operations Manager Antoine Laurent said. The traumatized, exhausted passengers include 120 minors, many of them traveling alone, and seven pregnant women. Several migrants had water in their lungs, suffered hypothermia or burns from a mix of boat fuel and seawater while in their traffickers' boats.

Malta had food and water ferried Monday to the Aquarius, which was running out of supplies.

"The situation is stable but it cannot run" on forever, Laurent said.

CORRECTS NAME OF BOAT This undated photo released by by French NGO "SOS Mediterranee" on Monday June 11, 2018 and posted on it's Twitter account, shows migrants about to board the SOS Mediterranee's Aquarius ship and MSF (Doctors Without Borders) NGOs, in the Mediterranean Sea. (Kenny Karpov/SOS Mediterranee via AP)

CORRECTS NAME OF BOAT This undated photo released by by French NGO "SOS Mediterranee" on Monday June 11, 2018 and posted on it's Twitter account, shows migrants about to board SOS Mediterranee's Aquarius ship and MSF (Doctors Without Borders) NGOs, in the Mediterranean Sea. (Kenny Karpov/SOS Mediterranee via AP)

A doctor aboard the ship, David Beversluis, said one passenger had to be revived after he was rescued.

"All the survivors are exhausted and dehydrated because they spent many hours adrift in these boats," he said.

Even as the Aquarius' crew grappled with the logistics, Italy vowed to block other rescue boats, including the Dutch-flagged Sea-Watch 3, another aid group's boat. Like the Aquarius, the Sea-Watch 3 rescued migrants in the waters off Libya, where human smugglers are based and asylum-hopefuls have reported torture, beatings, rape and scarce rations in migrant detention centers.

"Little changes if the boat is called Aquarius or Sea-Watch 3," Salvini, the interior minister, said. "We want to put an end to this traffic in human beings. And, so, as we have raised the problem for the Aquarius, we'll do it for all the other boats."

Even as he drew his line, an Italian coast guard vessel with 936 migrants and two migrants' bodies on board was headed toward Catania, Sicily, where it was expected to dock on Tuesday evening, Italian news agency ANSA said. The passengers were rescued in seven separate operations.

The President of the Republic of Malta Marie Louise Coleiro Preca arrives at the University of Catania to attend the 'Virdimura' International Award, in Catania, on the southern Italia island of Sicily, Monday, June 11, 2018. Malta is accusing Italy of violating international norms by instructing a migrant rescue ship with 629 people aboard to stay at sea while a diplomatic standoff plays out over where it can dock. (Orietta Scardino/ANSA via AP)

CAPTION CORRECTS THE NAME OF THE BOAT FILE - In this Aug. 29, 2017 file photo, African migrants float on a wooden boat next to a rescue ship during a search and rescue operation conducted by SOS Mediterranee's Aquarius ship and MSF (Doctors Without Borders) NGOs, in the Mediterranean Sea, north of Libyan coast.  (AP Photo/Darko Bandic, file)

The exulting by Salvini, who is also deputy premier, nearly eclipsed the satisfaction expressed by his fellow deputy, Luigi Di Maio, who leads the governing coalition's senior partner, the euroskeptic 5-Star Movement.

Spain's offer is "important news, since it signals a turning point," Di Maio said.

The vast majority of the people traveling on the Aquarius — 400 — were rescued by Italian coast guard and navy vessels as well as cargo ships in the waters off Libya. They were transferred to the Aquarius on Saturday before the standoff developed.

Given that the aid ship had no emergency, Italy decided to appeal to other European countries "so they don't leave Italy alone yet again in managing the migratory flows, which is a phenomenon that is all of Europe's business," Di Maio said in a Facebook post.

FILE - In this Saturday, June 9, 2018 filer, migrants line-up after disembarking at the Reggio Calabria harbor, Southern Italy. An aid ship carrying 629 migrants rescued in the Mediterranean was waiting to learn where it can dock. (Marco Costantino/ANSA via AP, File)

Under a European Union agreement, the country where asylum-seekers arrive and are identified must care for them until their asylum requests are decided, a process that can take a couple of years.

The refusals by Italy and Malta, leaving the Aquarius unable to quickly bring the migrants to a safe port, dismayed others.

"The duty of a democratic government is not to look away" in a humanitarian crisis, said Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau, who also offered her port as a potential solution to the standoff.

Italy had argued that Malta, a tiny island nation that also is an EU member, was the safest, closest port to the ship. Malta, which in the last few years has only accepted a few hundred migrants, refused, retorting that it bore no responsibility because Italy had coordinated the rescues in Libya's search-and-rescue zone.

Maltese Premier Joseph Muscat accused Italy of violating international norms governing sea rescues and said the government's stance risked "creating a dangerous situation for all those involved." He thanked Spain for stepping in.

Italy's premier, Giuseppe Conte, a political novice who backs the 5-Star Movement, on Monday was touring towns in struck by a 2016 quake. He hailed Spain's decision as a "gesture of solidarity" on behalf of the European Union.

The decision by Sanchez "to exceptionally allow a rescue ship, Aquarius, to dock in his country is courageous and welcome," the head of the United Nations refugee agency, Filippo Grandi, said.

Doctors Without Borders tweeted a video of some of the women aboard the ship praying Monday morning. "Thank you, Lord," the women sang.

The passengers, with many migrants from Sudan among them, were apparently unaware of they had become pawns of sorts in Europe's new political equilibrium.

"Italy has stopped bowing our heads and obeying," Salvini said in a Facebook post. "This time we say no."

BEIRUT (AP) — The European Union announced Thursday an aid package for Lebanon of 1 billion euros — about $1.06 billion — that will mostly go to boost border control to halt the flow of asylum seekers and migrants from the small, crisis-wracked country across the Mediterranean Sea to Cyprus and Italy.

The deal follows other EU aid packages for countries such as Egypt, Tunisia and Mauritania to fortify their borders. It comes against a backdrop of increasing hostility toward Syrian refugees in Lebanon and a major surge in irregular migration of Syrian refugees from Lebanon to Cyprus.

European Union Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said during a Beirut visit with Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides that the aid distribution will start this year and last till 2027.

The bulk of the aid — 736 million euros — would go to support Syrian refugees “and other vulnerable groups” in Lebanon, while 200 million euros are meant to bolster Lebanese security services in enforcing border and migration control, according to figures provided by the Cypriot government.

An unspecified amount would go to Lebanese fishermen, to discourage them from selling their boats to smugglers.

Von der Leyen said the EU will also work on a “more structured approach to voluntary return" of Syrian refugees "in close cooperation with” the U.N. refugee agency. The bloc will continue to maintain “legal pathways” for resettlement of refugees in Europe, she said.

Lebanon's Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati praised the package, saying that “Lebanon’s security is security for European countries and vice versa,” and that an escalation of the crisis ”will not be limited to Lebanon but will extend to Europe."

Lebanon, which has been in the throes of a severe financial crisis since 2019, hosts nearly 780,000 registered Syrian refugees and hundreds of thousands more who are unregistered, the world's highest refugee population per capita.

Lebanese political officials have for years urged the international community to resettle the refugees in other countries or assist their return to Syria — voluntarily or not. Lebanese security forces have stepped up deportations of Syrians over the past year.

Tensions further flared after an official with the Christian nationalist Lebanese Forces party, Pascal Suleiman, was killed last month in what military officials said was a botched carjacking by a Syrian gang. The incident prompted outbreaks of anti-Syrian violence by vigilante groups.

Meanwhile, Cypriot authorities complain the island nation has been overwhelmed by irregular migration of Syrian asylum seekers, many of them coming on boats from Lebanon.

The UNHCR in Lebanon said it had verified 59 “actual or attempted” departures by boats carrying a total of 3,191 passengers from Lebanon between January and mid-April, compared to three documented boat movements carrying 54 passengers in the same period last year. Usually, few boats attempt the much more dangerous crossing in the winter. In all of 2023, UNHCR recorded 65 boat departures carrying 3,927 passengers.

Cyprus has taken a new approach to halting the flow of migrants. Last month, it suspended processing of Syrian asylum applications, and human rights groups accused the Cypriot coast guard of forcibly turning back five boats carrying about 500 asylum seekers coming from Lebanon. Cypriot officials have denied this.

Bassel al-Shayoukh, a Syrian refugee from Idlib living in Lebanon since 2014, said his brother and several cousins and nephews were on one of the boats turned back. Now he wants to make the journey himself.

“In the beginning I thought that in a year or two the war would be over in Syria,” he said, but it dragged on, while in Lebanon “every year ... the situation began to get worse.”

Shayoukh said he fears being beaten by vigilantes or deported to Syria after Lebanese authorities declined to renew his residency permit.

His 17-year-old nephew, who declined to give his name fearing for his safety, said the Cypriot coast guard started making waves to push the boat he was on away. “I was terrified... I don’t know how to swim,” he said. “I thought we were going to die.”

The people on the boats “stayed three days without food or water” before turning back to Lebanon, the teen added.

Back in Lebanon, they were detained by the army; those registered with UNHCR were released and the others deported.

Mohammed Sablouh, a Lebanese human rights lawyer who works on refugee and migrant cases, says Lebanese authorities are deliberately “turning a blind eye" to the surge in migration to "pressure the international community.”

The Lebanese army did not respond to a request for comment on their measures to combat smuggling.

Thursday's aid announcement comes ahead of the annual fundraising conference for Syria in Brussels later this month. After 13 years of civil war, donor fatigue has set in while the world’s attention is occupied by the humanitarian fallout of more recent conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza.

The Cypriot president said Thursday was a “historic day” and called for European officials to go farther and declare some areas of Syria safe for return.

“The current situation is not sustainable for Lebanon. It is not sustainable for Cyprus, it is not sustainable for the European Union,” Christodoulides said.

But not all Lebanese officials are convinced the European aid would solve the problem.

Lebanese Forces party head Samir Geagea told The Associated Press earlier this week that European authorities are mainly concerned “that the refugees don’t go to Europe."

"For us the problem is that we cannot have our country drowning in illegal Syrian refugees,” Geagea said, urging for Syrians to be sent back to either government or opposition-held areas of the neighboring country.

But Shayoukh says he has nowhere to go.

The Damascus government wants him for opposing Syrian President Bashar Assad, he said, while the Islamist group that now controls his hometown behaves "the same way as the regime’s intelligence services” in crushing dissidents.

Associated Press writer Menelaos Hadjicostis in Nicosia, Cyprus, contributed to this report.

Follow AP’s global migration coverage at: https://apnews.com/hub/migration

Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, center, speaks during his meeting with Cyprus' President Nikos Christodoulides, left, and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, center, speaks during his meeting with Cyprus' President Nikos Christodoulides, left, and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, center, welcomes Cyprus' president Nikos Christodoulides, left, and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen before their meeting at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, center, Cyprus' President Nikos Christodoulides, left, and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen pose for photograph at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, right, welcomes Cyprus' president Nikos Christodoulides before their meeting at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Cyprus' President Nikos Christodoulides, left, and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, center, review an honor guard upon their arrival to meet with the Lebanese Speaker Nabih Berri, in Beirut, Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, center, speaks during his meeting with Cyprus' President Nikos Christodoulides, left, and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, center, welcomes Cyprus' President Nikos Christodoulides, left, and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, May 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)