The authorities instructed the humanitarian ship to disembark them at the ‘remote port’ of Genoa.

On Thursday, the Ocean Viking ship dropped off 40 migrants rescued in the Mediterranean on the island of Sardinia but Italian authorities did not allow it to disembark another 45 people.

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“We were told the port of Olbia in Sardinia” to drop off 28 unaccompanied minors, including three “very small” children, one ten months old, another six and another four, as well as 12 women, three of them pregnant, one of whom was nine months old, said SOS Mediterranee, the non-governmental organization that owns the humanitarian ship.

It was “a transfer operation” in which an Italian Coast Guard patrol approached the Ocean Viking at sea to take the 28 minors and the 12 women because of their vulnerable condition.

SOS Mediterranee asked to leave the other migrants on board in Sardinia, but its request was not accepted and it is now sailing to Genoa, the port assigned by the authorities after the rescue operation and where it is expected to arrive on Friday. “It is not a positive situation,” said the NGO.

The assignment of Genoa comes within the framework of the “Distant Ports” policy promoted by the far-right Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

This policy forces NGOs to leave rescue areas for several days, which limits rescue efforts in the central Mediterranean and reduces the entry of migrants.

So far in 2025, more than 1,500 people have reached Italy via the Mediterranean route, considered one of the world’s deadliest and most dangerous ways. In 2024, more than 66,600 people arrived in the country, almost two-thirds less than the 157,000 who arrived the previous year.

teleSUR/ JF Source: EFE

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