Tunisia Offers Port to Boat Stranded for Two Weeks
Tunisia said it would take in 40 people left out at sea for two weeks after nations refused to take them in. The group, which includes Bangladeshis, Nigerians and Egyptians, were rescued last week but Italy, Malta and France refused to allow them in.
Tunisian prime minister Youssef Chahed said he would allow the Tunisian-flagged commercial boat carrying them to dock “for humanitarian reasons” but reiterated his concern that Europe should not interpret this as sanctioning their plan for offshore migrant screening centers in Tunisia.
Babies Drown When Boat Capsizes off Turkey
Six people died when their boat sank off the coast of western Turkey. They were thought to be headed to Greece. Three babies were among the dead, according to Turkish state media, while nine people were rescued and another was missing.
Some 1,500 people have drowned on the Mediterranean crossing to Europe this year, according to the U.N. migration agency. Some 55,000 have arrived in Europe by sea, nearly 21,000 of them reaching Spain. The agency noted that there has been a surge in arrivals to Spain in recent months – 230 people per day in the past two months.
Inquest Criticizes Healthcare Failures at Australian Offshore Center
An Australian coroner faulted Australian authorities for the 2014 death of an asylum seeker held on Papua New Guinea’s Manus Island. Hamid Khazaei died from severe sepsis after contracting a leg infection.
The inquest found that the clinic at the Manus Island center run by Australia did not have appropriate antibiotics and that Khazaei was not evacuated to Australia in time to save his life.
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- World Refugee Council: Refugees and the City: The Twenty-first-century Front Line
“Policy debates and initiatives that fail to account for the fast-changing dynamics of forced migration to cities are going to prove dangerously off the target and ineffective.”
- TIME: When War Goes Off Script
“So we are in a period that is different yet familiar, reminiscent in some ways of other phases in these conflicts. It is defined by murkiness, rather than finality. It features a cast of protagonists that includes many bad guys and few clearly good ones.”