The Libra ship arrives in Gjader. 10 Bangladeshi citizens and six Egyptians on board. The crossing will cost 250 thousand euros, 18 thousand each. But the courts could stop it. Here's why
The first Navy ship to transport the migrants to Albania is expected to arrive today. Those on board will be transferred to facilities in Shengjin and Gjader. But in the meantime, another match is being played in Italy. Decisive. A court will have to decide whether these detentions are legal. And it could bring down the entire system on which it is legally built. And the functioning of the Meloni government. In fact, 16 are present above Libra: 10 Bangladeshi citizens and 6 Egyptians. They had left the Libyan coasts of Sabatra and Zuara on board boats. The crossing, calculate today Republicwill cost between 250 and 290 thousand euros. Or around 18 thousand euros per migrant. For an operation which will cost around a billion to the state coffers. Their arrest must be validated within 48 hours by the judges of the Rome immigration section.
Migrants and Albania
The first selection of the castaways saved by the Italian patrol boats took place directly on the Libra bridge. Women and children, unaccompanied minors and shipwreck survivors from dangerous countries were returned to patrol boats and taken to Lampedusa. However, the sixteen men, adults and not belonging to vulnerable categories, remained on board the Italian Navy ship. The Farnesina consider their home country safe. Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi has already indicated that the government is ready to challenge any contrary decision and submit it to the judgment of “the highest courts of our country”. But the most concrete risk is that what the head of the Interior Ministry hopes for will come true anyway and independently of his will. And above all, it can be explosive for the executive.
Safe countries and dangerous countries
Egypt and Bangladesh are indeed among the destinations stigmatized by the European Court of Justice. In a ruling dated October 4, the judges recalled the criterion for considering a country as “safe”. This must be the case in all areas of its territory. And for each category of person. In fact, the country considered safe must under no circumstances implement “persecution, torture or any other inhumane treatment”. Countries that do not meet this criterion include Tunisia, Bangladesh and Egypt. In addition, the Piantedosi decree is already being examined by the Constitutional Court.
As he explains today The pressthe legislative decree would violate certain principles such as that of proportionality and reasonableness of the sanction in the law which provides for detention of 20 days in the event of violation and confiscation in the event of repeat offense.
Tunisia, Egypt and Bangladesh
Furthermore, the principle of specificity is contested and the assessment of the illicit behavior of NGOs is left to the discretion of the authorities of a third state, in this case Libya. The rules would contradict the rescue obligations established by Italian law (violation of articles 10 and 117 of the Constitution). Since its entry into force, the Piantedosi decree has resulted in 557 days of detention for NGO vessels. The newspaper recalls that for more than a year, after the first contested cases of the Apostolic and Cupri judges, the Italian courts have challenged, by releasing the migrants, the so-called accelerated border procedures which provide for differentiated treatment for migrants coming from safe country.
The judgment of the European Court
The framework of the Piantedosi Decree is the one on which most procedures for Albania are based. This is why a negative decision on the first would have repercussions on the others. Added to all this is the judgment of the European Court. The judges argue that to be considered safe, a country must be generally and uniformly safe. That is to say throughout its territory and for each category of people. And they stigmatize the very definition for countries like Tunisia, Egypt and Bangladesh. That is to say the countries of origin of many migrants who arrive in Italy.