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| - Humanitarian groups claimed on Thursday that European Union planes are spotting stranded migrants in the Mediterranean yet only alerting Libya's coast guard, enabling illegal pushbacks and preventing rescues by charity organisations. That growing practice is in violation of international law and the human rights of migrants, who are sent back to dangerous detention camps in Libya, said four European migrant rescue groups in a report published on Thursday. The associations - Alarm Phone, Borderline-Europe, Mediterranea Saving Humans and Sea-Watch - said "tens of thousands" of migrants have been returned to Libya's war zone and prevented from reaching Europe due to the EU's use of aerial surveillance. The strategy has also resulted in shipwrecks and "mass fatalities," they said. Humanitarian groups have long claimed that European countries have in essence shirked their duty to rescue migrants at sea in order to prevent them from heading to their shores. But the 30-page report documents in detail three 2019 episodes the groups said they had directly witnessed and were emblematic of the EU's current operations in the Mediterranean, warning such incidents were increasing. "EU actors have delegated responsibility to the Libyan authorities and become complicit in the systematic interception and return of people seeking to escape from Libya," read the report. The cases "show in stark relief the crucial role played by EU aerial surveillance in mass interceptions off the coast of Libya, which have been expanded over recent months." The EU's management of migration at sea is now done "by avoiding any kind of physical contact with people on the move," said the report. Italy and Libya signed a memorandum of understanding in February 2017 that saw Italy supply patrol vessels to Tripoli. Meanwhile, the EU has cut back on search-and-rescue operations, instead relying on aerial surveillance while boosting Libya's maritime patrols, with financial support and training. Frontex, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, is relying on drones and planes "to gain knowledge of the presence of boats in distress and their positions without having to engage in rescue activities," the report charged. Moreover, if such boats are spotted in the zone patrolled by Libya, the agency is alerting only Tripoli's coast guard, even when charity or cargo ships in the area "could help in a faster and more appropriate way." A Frontex spokesman said the allegations were "utterly wrong," adding that the agency had helped save more than 330,000 people over the past few years. It denied the use of drones. "Each time we alert rescue centres in the region about the situation, as required by international law. The priority is to save the lives of the people in need," said spokesman Chris Borowski, adding that "numerous" rescue centres are alerted. Frontex said that, under international law, it was up to the "relevant rescue centre" to decide which boats in which areas are called to participate in the rescue. But the report alleged that the EU planes "spot migrant boats in distress and contact only the Libyan authorities to de facto prevent other ships from engaging and from disembarking the rescued at a safe port." That practice has delayed rescues, sometimes by as much as 12 hours, while forcing people back to a country at war in violation of international law, it said. The Libyan coast guard's "incompetence" and Europe's aerial strategy have also resulted in untold deaths, despite having planes in the air and cargo ships nearby. ams/ide/bsp
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