ATHENS: A year after one of the Mediterranean’s worst migrant shipwrecks killed more than 600 people, lawyers for survivors pursuing a criminal case against the Greek coast guard gave fresh details on the case Thursday.
The rusty and overloaded trawler Adriana sank on the night of June 13-14 last year. It was carrying more than 750 people, according to the United Nations, but only 82 bodies were found.
Lawyers representing dozens of survivors held a news conference after a court in Kalamata last month dropped charges against nine Egyptian men accused of being part of the criminal gang operating the trawler.
Among the 104 survivors, 53 have filed a group criminal complaint, alleging the coast guard took hours to mount a response despite warnings from EU border agency Frontex and the NGO Alarm Phone.
“This was a crime committed over a 15-hour period,” Eleni Spathana, a lawyer with the Refugee Support Aegean (RSA) group, told journalists.
The case is still under preliminary investigation by the naval court of Piraeus, but the survivors’ lawyers say they have found many irregularities in the Greek coast guard’s actions before and after the incident.
The boat was sailing from Tobruk, Libya to Italy. In addition to Syrians and Palestinians, it was carrying nearly 350 Pakistanis, according to the Pakistani government.
Survivors said the coast guard was towing the vessel when it capsized and sank 47 nautical miles off the coast of Pylos.
The coast guard has insisted it communicated with people on board who “refused any help,” rendering any rescue operation in high seas risky.
But on Thursday Maria Papamina, legal coordinator for the Greek Council for Refugees, said the coast guard chose to dispatch a patrol boat from Crete — and not a larger rescue tugboat stationed closer by at the Peloponnese port of Gythio.
The patrol boat’s voyage data recorder was damaged and was only repaired two months after the accident, Papamina added. Nor was there any video footage from the patrol boat.
“There are reasonable concerns of an attempted cover-up,” she said.
Spathana of the RSA added: “There was clearly no intent to rescue before the boat sank. Not only is this terrifying, it is criminally liable.”
Eighteen of the victims remain unburied, including eight still to be identified.
The independent Greek ombudsman’s office has launched a disciplinary investigation into the case, after the coast guard saw no grounds to do so, the lawyers said Thursday.
On Friday, victims’ relatives in Pakistan plan to gather in the city of Lala Musa to protest the lack of response from the Greek authorities to the tragedy, organizers in Athens said.
Migrant shipwreck victims pursue case against Greek coast guard
https://arab.news/4cv85
Migrant shipwreck victims pursue case against Greek coast guard
- 53 have filed a group criminal complaint, alleging the coast guard took hours to mount a response despite warnings from EU border agency Frontex and the NGO Alarm Phone
- The case is still under preliminary investigation by the naval court of Piraeus
France provided ‘logistical’ support to help Benin thwart coup: Macron aide
- Macron led a “coordination effort” by speaking with key regional leaders
- The situation in Benin “caused serious concern for the president (Macron) ,” said the aide
PARIS: France provided logistical support and surveillance assistance to help the west African state of Benin thwart a coup attempt that was foiled at the weekend, an aide to President Emmanuel Macron said Tuesday.
Macron led a “coordination effort” by speaking with key regional leaders, while France — at the request of the Beninese authorities — provided assistance “in terms of surveillance, observation and logistical support” to the Benin armed forces, the aide, asking not to be named, told reporters.
Further details on the nature of the assistance were not immediately available.
A group of soldiers on Sunday took over the national television station and announced that President Patrice Talon had been deposed.
But loyalist army forces ultimately defeated the attempted putsch with the help of neighboring Nigeria, which carried out military strikes on Cotonou and deployed troops.
West Africa has endured a sequence of coups in the last years that have severely eroded French influence and presence in what were French colonies up until independence.
Mali saw coups in 2020 and 2021, followed by Burkina Faso in 2022 and then Niger in 2023. French forces that had been deployed in these countries for an anti-jihadist operation consequently pulled out.
A successful putsch in Benin, also a former French colony, would have been seen as a new blow to the standing of Paris and Macron in the region.
On Sunday, Macron spoke with Talon as well as the leaders of top regional power Nigeria, and Sierra Leone, which holds the presidency of West African regional bloc ECOWAS, the aide said.
The situation in Benin “caused serious concern for the president (Macron), who unequivocally condemned this attempt at destabilization, which fortunately failed,” said the aide.
ECOWAS has said troops from Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria and Sierra Leone were being deployed to Benin to help the government “preserve constitutional order.”
The bloc had threatened intervention during Niger’s 2023 coup that deposed president Mohamed Bazoum — an ally of Macron — but ultimately did not act.
France also did not carry out any intervention against the Niger coup.
“France has offered its full political support to ECOWAS, which made a very significant effort this weekend,” said the aide.
