There are no taxis in the sea

An Italian examining judge of Agrigento ruled that the charges against Carola Rackete (pictured above as leaves court after she was arrested for forcing her way into a Sicilian port carrying migrants she had rescued off the Libyan coast) did not hold water, so to say, because, in leading the migrants to Lampedusa, she obeyed to international humanitarian law. That means that the Sea-Watch 3 humanitarian ship’s skipper is free to go and... leave the country, as the same authorities which put her under house arrest have already issued an expulsion order for her. However, even the new “edict” will have to be approved by the judicial authorities. Photo: Giovanni Isolino/AFP/Getty Images.

Life of Pi

The captain of a German NGO rescue ship carrying 42 migrants has been arrested after more than two weeks in a standoff with Italian authorities. Carola Rackete reached Lampedusa, Sicily, on Saturday in defiance of a ban issued by Italy’s far-right interior minister. She was greeted by lengthy applause from hundreds of people who arrived on the quay to support her. [Read more].

Noah’s Ark

German NGO rescue ship Sea Watch decided to file a case at the European Human Rights Court against Italy for refusing to allow its ship carrying 47 rescued migrants to dock. Sea Watch’s spokesman Ruben Neugebauer points the finger against Italy’s far-right interior minister, who would be “taking the people on board as political hostages”. The Po Valley strongman’s hardline attitude was also harshly contested by Italian Association for Infant Mental Health (AISMI): “As infant mental health workers we reiterate the urgency of immediately landing migrants, so as to help them with the necessary health and psychological care, especially children and adolescents. Their unwarranted and inadmissible detention onboard the Sea Watch represents a further abuse perpetrated against them — specifically by Italian authorities, which instead have the duty of safeguarding the physical and psychological health of anyone is found on Italian territory”, AISMI President Giampaolo Nicolais said.

A street art graffiti by British artist Banksy. Credit: Philippe Huguen/AFP/Getty Images.

The Importance of Not Being Arcovazzi

Italy’s Democratic Party delegation finally climbed aboard the NGO rescue ship Sea Watch, which is anchored, with 47 asylum seekers (among them there are at least 13 minors), in waters close to the Sicilian city of Siracusa, Italy since a week ago, due to the refusal of the far-right interior minister to give it access to Italy’s ports. All Italy’s parties apparently agree that for this, as for what occurred with the vessel Diciotti last August, the far-right interior minister should be prosecuted and put on trial.

A boy riding a pig. Artwork by Banksy.

Just don’t ask him to be a statist

The result of an inspection commendably requested by the Commander of the vessel Diciotti, and carried out in the morning of Saturday, August 25, 2018 by physicians of the Ministry of Health and USMAF (Maritime, Aviation and Border Health Office), certified that at least eleven women among the migrants on board were actually raped in Libya’s detention centres, where Italy’s far-right interior minister intended to send them back, and about which he had said just last June 25: “Lybia’s detention facilities are in the vanguard, let’s stop with the rhetoric of torture”.

Photo elaboration by Russian fine art photographer Platon Yurich. Photo © Platon Yurich.

Ghost Vessel

The Prosecutor of Agrigento, Luigi Patronaggio, on Saturday left without speaking to reporters after questioning two Interior Ministry lower-level officials at the Rome prosecutors’ office, Italian news agency ANSA reported. The Prosecutor could decide to investigate suspected kidnapping, after the guarantor of personal rights office concluded this week that the migrants were being unjustly held by the government.

The Prosecutor of Agrigento, Luigi Patronaggio (centre), on the Ubaldo Diciotti vessel in Catania, Sicily. Photo: Orietta Scardino/EPA.

The Importance of Not Being Arcovazzi

Doctors ordered on Saturday that 17 sick migrants be allowed to leave the Italian Coast Guard vessel Diciotti docked for five days in Catania, Italy to urgently receive proper medical care, while the remaining 133 people on board are still held as hostages by Italy’s far-right government, which so far might have already violated at least 8 national and international laws.

Migrants wait to disembark from the Italian Coast Guard vessel Diciotti at the port of Catania, Italy on August 22, 2018. Photo: Reuters/Antonio Parrinello.

The Importance of Not Being Arcovazzi

• Isabel Choat, Under the volcano: a tour of Etna and north-east Sicily, The Guardian, August 23, 2018

In the shadow... the town of Castiglione di Sicilia, with Etna in the background. Photo: Alamy.

The People from Another Place

• Associated Press, The Latest: Italy official: migrants kept on ship unjustly, The Washington Post, August 23, 2018

Migrants wait to disembark from Italian Coast Guard ship Diciotti in the port of Catania, Italy on Thursday, August 23, 2018. A delegation from Italy’s guarantor of personal rights office has boarded a coast guard ship in a Sicilian port with 150 African migrants stuck aboard for days, after the Italian far-right interior minister vowed none will set foot on Italian soil. Photo: Orietta Scardino/ANSA via AP/Associated Press

A Mediterranean Odyssey

Pozzallo, Italy: Migrants disembark from the Danish-flagged container ship Alexander Mærsk at the Sicilian port. The Mærsk, with more than 100 migrants on board, had remained off the coast of Pozzallo for days after taking part in a rescue of people leaving Libya on smugglers’ boats. Photo: Salvatore Cavalli/AP.

The Vessel

Pozzallo, Sicily, Italy: A migrant waits to disembark from the Italian Coast Guard vessel Diciotti following a rescue operation of migrants and refugees at sea. Photo: Giovanni Isolino/AFP/Getty Images.

The Importance of Not Being Arcovazzi

• Angela Giuffrida, Sicilian mayor moves to block far-right plan to disrupt migrant rescues, The Guardian, July 21, 2017

People leap into the water as they are helped by an NGO rescue operation in the Mediterranean near Libya. Photo: Emilio Morenatti/AP.

The Importance of Not Being Arcovazzi

On the South Pier, at the Port of Catania, Sicily, Italy, it is parked in dry dock the first boat that in 2013 carried migrants from Africa to the coasts of Catania. Among them, there were six Egyptian children who, sick and exhausted from the boat trip, tragically drowned just a few meters from the shore of Lido Beach Green (Lido Verde). Chinese chameleon 劉勃麟 (Liú Bólín) wanted to merge his body with the wreck and its history for the first shot of his very recent “Migrants” exhibition, successfully held in Palermo, Sicily, Italy. Photo © 劉勃麟 (Liú Bólín)/Courtesy of Boxart Gallery, Verona.

Myths of Europe

Pozzallo, Italy: A boy sits on deck after being rescued from the Mediterranean Sea. Photo: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images.