The crisis of recurring deadly migrant shipwrecks in the Mediterranean is a tragedy, which is in dire need of a coordinated rescue response, a top United Nations official says.
“Our ability to save lives at sea has to be guaranteed because the current situation is a tremendous tragedy,” said UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Antonio Guterres at a briefing at the Organization of American States in Washington late on Wednesday.
The remarks came after an overcrowded boat capsized on April 19, about 96 kilometers (60 miles) off the Libyan coast and 193 kilometers (120 miles) south of the Italian island of Lampedusa, on its way to Europe.
The fatal incident, in which 800 people are feared to have perished, could be the deadliest in a series of migrant shipwrecks that have claimed over 1,750 lives so far in 2015.
Although EU foreign ministers have already agreed to double the funding of the bloc’s Mediterranean maritime border patrol mission, Triton, refugee officials still believe that it is inadequate and have called on Italy to resume larger-scale naval patrols off Libya.
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