- Frontex, the EU border agency, does not normally inform nongovernmental rescue ships in the Mediterranean when it spots boats in distress or regularly issue emergency alerts.
- This has contributed to avoidable delays and tragic shipwrecks as well as to people being forcibly returned to countries where they face abuse.
- A new campaign asks Frontex to uphold its EU and international law obligations and our shared humanity by prioritizing saving lives at sea and asks campaign supporters to press officials to improve policies.
(Brussels, October 24, 2024) – Frontex, the European Union’s Border and Coast Guard agency, should use its aerial surveillance capacity to ensure timely rescues of vessels in distress, Human Rights Watch said today as it opened a new campaign, #WithHumanity.
“Frontex planes and drones should use their eyes on the Mediterranean Sea to save lives,” said Judith Sunderland, associate Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “With thousands dying in the Mediterranean every year, it’s vital for Frontex to do all it can to help ensure that people on unseaworthy boats are rescued and brought to safety.”
As European leaders double down on plans to prevent people from arriving on EU soil and to speed up deportations, it’s all the more important to remember our shared humanity, Human Rights Watch said. People fleeing abuse and hardship will continue to undertake ever more perilous journeys and should not be left to drown.
Currently, when Frontex planes and drones detect boats carrying asylum seekers, refugees, and migrants in the Mediterranean, the agency alerts rescue coordination centers in EU member states as well as in Libya and Tunisia. It does not, however, systematically inform nongovernmental rescue ships in the area or regularly issue emergency alerts to mobilize all nearby vessels. This has led to people being intercepted by Libyan and Tunisian forces and forcibly returned to those countries, where they face serious human rights abuses. The failure to issue systematic emergency alerts can also contribute to avoidable delays and tragic shipwrecks.
Over the last decade, more than 30,500 people have died or been reported missing in the Mediterranean, according to the International Organization for Migration, with at least 1,600 dead or missing since January 2024 alone.
A 2022 analysis by Human Rights Watch and Border Forensics of Frontex aerial surveillance concluded that the agency’s practices make it complicit in well-documented abusive and indefinite arbitrary detention and other serious human rights violations in Libya. On the Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors without Borders or MSF) rescue ship Geo Barents in September 2024, Human Rights Watch conducted in-depth interviews with 11 people who had been rescued.
All of them had experienced abuse, including allegations of sexual violence, forced labor, and beatings, in official Libyan detention centers or in smuggler captivity. The ship’s midwife said that two of the women who had been rescued discovered they were pregnant as a result of being raped. Many of the people interviewed had been detained numerous times following interceptions at sea.
A 20-year-old Ethiopian man fleeing the conflict in Ethiopia’s Amhara region was intercepted by Libyan Coast Guard forces earlier this year and held for four months in the al-Nasr detention facility in Zawiya (also known as Osama prison). He said the director of the detention facility demanded US$3,000 to release him. Unable to pay, he said he worked, cleaning and interpreting, until the director let him go after almost four months. Describing the prison, he said: “They caught a lot of people on the sea, they pay to get out.”
Frontex coordination with Tunisian forces for the purposes of enabling interceptions is also alarming due to the deteriorated human rights situation in the country generally and the risk of serious harm to migrants, asylum seekers, and refugees, Human Rights Watch said.
While Black Africans have faced particular discrimination and abuses by Tunisian authorities, including collective expulsions, a 24-year-old Syrian man told Human Rights Watch that he was also affected.
He said Tunisian forces used dangerous maneuvers at sea when they intercepted his boat in February 2024 and subsequently expelled him, along with roughly a hundred other people, to Libya, where he was held in the al-Assa detention center. He had to pay $1,500 to be released. A joint statement signed on October 10 by 64 organizations, including Human Rights Watch, urged the EU to refrain from considering Tunisia a place of safety to take people who have been rescued.
The 2023 Pylos shipwreck demonstrated the fatal consequences of a narrow definition of distress. After sighting a severely overcrowded wooden boat in the Greek search-and-rescue region, Frontex informed relevant coastal authorities but did not issue an emergency alert to all vessels in the area on the grounds that there was no “imminent risk of loss of life.” Hours later the ship capsized and more than 600 people lost their lives.
While evidence suggests that the Greek Coast Guard played a direct role in the shipwreck, prompt action by Frontex might have averted the tragedy. An inquiry by the European Ombudsman concluded in February 2024 that Frontex had “inadequate guidance” on how to respond to maritime emergencies, “including regarding the issuance of emergency signals.”
Properly used, support from Frontex planes and drones can help save lives. On October 14, 2023, for example, a Frontex plane shared the coordinates of an overcrowded, inflatable raft over an open radio channel and later returned to the scene and updated the coordinates. The MSF rescue ship Geo Barents was ultimately able to perform a nighttime rescue and save 64 people, including women and children. As Fulvia Conte, the MSF search-and-rescue team leader, said, “to have precise coordinates, taken from the sky, with a thermal camera, of course it helps when searching for a boat.”
Frontex should take concrete steps to use its technology and expertise to save lives, Human Rights Watch said. The agency should ensure that the location of boats in distress sighted by Frontex aircraft is transmitted systematically to rescue ships in the area operated by nongovernmental groups and issue more frequent emergency alerts based on a broad definition of distress. Frontex aircraft should also monitor distress cases and provide assistance when needed.
Through the #WithHumanity campaign, Human Rights Watch is asking the public to take a closer look at the lives and rights at risk in the Mediterranean Sea and their shared humanity with those making the crossing, and to demand action by the responsible authorities. This is the first part of a broader campaign calling on the EU to abandon its efforts to shift responsibility to third countries like Libya, Tunisia, Lebanon, Turkey, and Egypt, where migrants, asylum seekers, and refugees are exposed to human rights violations. Instead, the EU should uphold human rights and act more effectively to ensure safe and legal channels to Europe.
“By focusing on the aspirations of people taking these dangerous journeys, we hope that people across Europe will join us in urging Frontex to prioritize saving lives at sea,” Sunderland said. “Europe’s coast guard should uphold EU and international law and our shared commitment to humanity and the protection of life.”
