Refugees, Cutro: “I survived my six-year-old brother, I dived into the frozen water, but it didn’t help”

ROME (DIRE agency) – “That night I grabbed my 6-year-old brother Sultan and with my uncle we jumped into the freezing water. After an hour, around 4 in the morning, my little brother died. The Italian coastguard arrived two hours later to recover us”. Assad Almulqi is a 22-year-old Syrian refugee, one of the survivors of the shipwreck of Cutro, in Calabria, in which 94 people died, including 35 children. From Turkey, three days earlier, 160 had left, mostly Afghans and Pakistanis. His uncle Feras Alghazy adds: “When we jumped into the water there were still many people on the boat, we heard people screaming, even the children. After 30-40 seconds there was silence: they had all drowned”.

The alleged failures in the rescue. Now the two men live in Germany, where little Sultan rests in the Dresden cemetery. To collect the testimonies of those moments is an investigation by the collective of international journalists Lighthouse Reportscreated thanks to a collaboration between five European newspapers, including the Italian one Tomorrow. Thanks to unpublished documents and recordings and 3D reconstructions, the investigation aims to reconstruct the alleged flaws in the rescue machine. The reporters conclude by accusing Frontex and the Italian authorities of knowing that the ‘Summer Love’ – the gulet designed for 16 people and which could accommodate ten times as many – was in grave danger almost six hours before it crashed off the Calabrian resort, under weather conditions
prohibitive.

Investigate the Prosecutor of Crotone. The Crotone prosecutor’s office is also investigating the matter, which on 1 June ordered searches and checks in the offices of Frontex, Guardia di Finanza and Coast Guard and issued six notices of guarantee for murder and culpable disaster as a result of failure to rescue. Three of the suspects are financiers, while the identity of the other three is “omissis”, i.e. has not yet been disclosed. Among the main novelties that emerge from the work of Lighthousethere would be documents relating to Frontex which would highlight inconsistencies in the information transmitted in real time to the Italian authorities: if it has been publicly stated that the ‘Summer Love‘ was identified thanks to a satellite call from the small boat, these documents would indicate that there were actually more phone calls, an element that should have strengthened the thesis according to which it could be a boat with migrants on board.

What has not been done and should have been done. If the strong thermal response and the very low waterline had not been sufficient elements, then, the “strong winds” detected by the pilot of the Frontex reconnaissance aircraft who first spotted the gulet could have immediately triggered an operation of search and rescue (SAR) from Italy. However, although bad weather was the reason why the plane returned, the European border control agency after the sinking said that the ‘Eagle 1’ aircraft had returned to base “to refuel”. Klaas van Dijken, director of Lighthouse Reportsunderlines: “The reconstructions provided by the Italian authorities and by Frontex did not match immediately, we knew that someone was not telling the truth. On the other hand, the overcrowding of a boat, as well as the bad weather conditions, are in themselves signs of danger which, according to the rules of Frontex and Italy, must trigger a Sar operation and not a police one.Thus with our work – he concludes – we wanted to reconstruct the story of that night: the survivors and the families of the 94 victims have the right to know”.

Amnesty International’s appeal. atDire agency the spokesman of Amnesty International Riccardo Noury ​​launches an appeal: “It’s enough to reshuffle the responsibilities: the Italian authorities and Frontex say what went wrong and assume responsibility, because that shipwreck could and should have been avoided”. Always at To say Filippo Miraglia, head of Immigration of Archobserves: “In the case of Cutro, the idea probably prevailed that a police operation was needed, despite the information available indicating a risk of shipwreck. The Italian authorities therefore sent control boats and not rescue boats, which were then due return due to bad weather conditions”.

Political will prevails over the urgency of relief. The manager warns that “too often political will prevails” over the urgency of relief. As demonstrated by the case of the “generous welcome” given to Ukrainian refugees after the outbreak of war, “as many as 170,000 arrived in Italy”. A “differentiated” treatment which, according to Miraglia, also concerns the Afghans themselves: “On the one hand, after the advent of the Taliban, Italy announced its willingness to welcome them: with the humanitarian corridors, several hundred people have arrived legally. Others, however, are then rejected along the Balkan route or kept away from Europe through the agreement signed with Erdogan’s Turkey, and paid for with taxpayers’ money.Italy could welcome much more, but by not planning interventions with resources certain, it produces the emergency that propaganda then exploits”.