Cap Anamur aids Boat People in the Mediterranean

Interview with Elias Bierdel of Cap Anamur
(Deutschlandfunk, 06/22/2004)

Müller: This weekend the German Aid Ship Cap Anamur saved a refugee boat with 37 people on board which had got into distress in the Mediterranean. The totally overloaded rubber dinghy with engine failure was drifting on open sea between the coast of Libya and the Italian island of Lampedusa. Elias Bierdel, head of Cap Anamur, is with us in the studio. What had actually happened?

Bierdel: We were on a technical test trip with the ship after engine repairs that we ourselves had undergone in Malta, and had set off in southern waters where we stumbled upon this boat in open sea. Admittedly in a zone where this kind of thing happens more often. Nevertheless to see a boat of this tiny size, filled to the brim with refugees, that must be a chance in thousands.

Müller: How did the rescue go?

Bierdel: After the look-out had seen the tiny rubber dinghy we went alongside and saw then that this boat was in no way at all sea worthy. The motor had failed, and one of the air chambers was already half empty. These were people in a life threatening situation, who, after signalling wildly, were very pleased to be able to come aboard. We provided them with food and water, and where necessary medical aid - some were suffering from hypothermia, but most recovered pretty quickly after they had eaten something. They had also run out of drinking water. That's something one should know, a major point of a situation like this is that many people don't drown but rather die of thirst on an open sea.

Müller: What did you find out from and about the refugees?

Bierdel: Of course we tried to find out where exactly they had come from and where they were heading. That is fairly difficult. They are obviously black Africans, from exactly where is not clear. Only a minority of them speak a little English. At present we are trying to organise translations including telephone connections here in Germany with people who speak various dialects in order to find out more. It's not quite clear. Evidently there are some who come from Sudan and that area, or so we think, but we aren't yet able to clearly establish that. Our priority was to get them to safety, then one thing is certain, this is a phenomenon which is widely spread in the area. We all remember the awful pictures last year of people who arrived at the European coastline dead or barely alive.

Müller: Last year was one of the largest refugee waves. Can we expect the same thing this year?

Bierdel: We do have the impression that it so to say "starting again". That is also what observers in the region are saying. Above all in Lampedusa. Alone this weekend, on Sunday 135 people were taken in on the tiny little island. The next day, yesterday, as we pulled 37 people out of the water, the Italian coastguard reported from a few miles further north that 200 people had also been rescued from two small wooden boats in distress. One can therefore presume that it is starting again and that means that yet again something is starting that we have been following for years. A drama at sea on the borders of the European Union. So many people over all these years - official numbers stand at between 3-4 thousand- pay with their lives . Out there at sea at the oceanic European borders.

Müller: What was your experience of the Italian authorities?

Bierdel: Up until now, very little. We got into all of this more by chance than by force. It's like this, we can observe in what magnitude the Mediterranean, this outer border, is militarised. That shook us. Let's be clear about this: Out there are whole fleets operating, by the way with NATO support, also with German participation, whose obvious and declared task it is to prevent illegal migration over sea. One asks oneself what methods military personnel use in order to do just that. They try to catch boats, to stop them and to force them to turn back. If we imagine that the boat that we found out there had been turned around, or that the attempt had been made to force the return or the boat then one should indeed have great concerns about what is going on out there. Apart from the fact that according to international law it is illegal to bother traffic on open ocean (that is, out of boundaries of National Waters), let alone force them away. But we have to suspect, to fear, that out there things happen that are not in union with international rights laws.

Müller: For which political alternatives does Cap Anamur stand?

Bierdel: For none at all. We are not a political organisation. Quite definitely not. We are underway as humanitarian aid, now with our own aid and rescue ship and therefore, bearing in mind our particular story, it is totally natural for us to aid people that we find in distress at sea. That is firstly clear. We take them on board, try to care for them, and of course take them to the nearest port, as is practice in International waters. Of course we realise that this may possibly bring us into conflict with national authorities, who perhaps don't want these people coming to them. We will see how much we can do for these people after the first priority of saving their lives.

Müller: But generally there are continuous discussions between the aid organisations on one side and the authorities on the other. Is there any sign of progress as far as aid is concerned?

Bierdel: As far as we can see, these politics are total closure of the "Fort Europe" against those who wish to come in from outside- and there is hardly any legal migration possible- a political stand which demands a high price, the price of hundreds and thousands of people who lose their lives on the outer borders of the EU (by the way not just on the water but also on land) and I do think that Europe must decide if this price is worth paying. If we all think it is normal that these people are dying because we shut the door. That is a question which needs to be answered politically. That is not our role. For now we are in an area where obviously people are in distress, and we are trying to help them. At this moment the ship is involved in a rescue operation, we had an emergency call, at this moment we are trying to help people.

Müller: Thank you. Elias Bierdel. Head of Cap Anamur.

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