GENEVA: The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights called on Friday for countries to clamp down on people smugglers and human traffickers after at least 78 migrants were killed in a shipwreck off the coast of Greece.
Witness accounts suggested between 400 and 750 people had packed a fishing boat that capsized and sank early on Wednesday morning about 80 kilometers from the southern coastal town of Pylos.
“What happened on Wednesday underscores the need to investigate people smugglers and human traffickers and ensure they are brought to justice,” Jeremy Laurence, UN Human Rights Office spokesperson, told reporters in Geneva.
“The High Commissioner reiterated his call to states to open up more regular migration channels and enhance responsibility sharing, ensure arrangements for the safe and timely disembarkation of all people rescued at sea, and the establishment of independent monitoring and oversight of migration related policies and practices.”
Dimitris Chaliotis, a Hellenic Red Cross volunteer who was part of the rescue operations, said that most migrants were from Libya and Syria. In the immediate aftermath of the disaster 104 survivors and 78 people who drowned were brought to shore by Greek authorities, but nothing has been found since.
Nine people have been arrested over the shipwreck, a Greek shipping ministry official said.
Greece is one of the main routes into the European Union for refugees and migrants from the Middle East, Asia and Africa.
The United Nations has recorded more than 20,000 deaths and disappearances in the central Mediterranean since 2014, making it the most dangerous migrant crossing in the world.
Nearly 3,800 people died on migration routes within and from the Middle East and North Africa last year, the highest number recorded there since 2017, according to data published earlier this month by the International Organization for Migration.
UN human rights chief urges clamp-down on people smugglers after shipwreck
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UN human rights chief urges clamp-down on people smugglers after shipwreck
- Witness accounts suggested between 400 and 750 people had packed a fishing boat that capsized and sank early on Wednesday morning
Brazil’s Lula accuses Trump of seeking to forge ‘new UN’
- Lula defended multilateralism against what he called “the law of the jungle” in global affairs
- Key US allies including France and Britain have also expressed doubts
BRASILIA: Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva accused Donald Trump on Friday of trying to create “a new UN” with his proposed “Board of Peace.”
The veteran leftist joins other world leaders who have avoided signing up for Trump’s new global conflict resolution organization, where a permanent seat costs $1 billion and the chairman is Trump himself.
“Instead of fixing” the United Nations, “what’s happening? President Trump is proposing to create a new UN where only he is the owner,” Lula said.
Trump unveiled his “Board of Peace” at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss ski resort of Davos Thursday, joined on stage by leaders and officials from 19 countries to sign its founding charter.
Lula defended multilateralism against what he called “the law of the jungle” in global affairs.
His remarks come a day after he spoke by phone with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, who urged his counterpart to safeguard the “central role” of the United Nations in international affairs.
In his remarks on Friday, Lula said “the UN charter is being torn.”
Although originally intended to oversee Gaza’s rebuilding, the board’s charter does not seem to limit its role to the Palestinian territory and appears to want to rival the United Nations.
Key US allies including France and Britain have also expressed doubts.
London balked at the inclusion of Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose forces are fighting in Ukraine after invading in 2022.
France said the charter as it currently stood was “incompatible” with its international commitments, especially its UN membership.
