Editorial

Not for the first, and certainly not for the last time, a number of would-be illegal immigrants trying to reach Italian territory from Libya have lost their lives when their boats capsized in rough seas. In the latest episode to concern us directly, 15 men reportedly drowned when their boat was buffeted by high waves - nine, who managed to survive, were picked up by a passing container ship some 113 miles to the south-east of Malta and brought to the Freeport.

Italian television yesterday reported other crossings in which more migrants drowned, while in a macabre touch, we learned that a Sicilian trawler caught three corpses in its nets.

The sad, tragic story continues to repeat itself also in the Atlantic, between the African coast and the Canary Islands, and it is not the first time that corpses were washed up on the coast of southern Sicily.

To the tragedies at sea one has to add the attempts to cross the Sahara desert, where unreported deaths must number thousands - and the shooting of desperate Moroccans as they stormed the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla some months ago.

The long-term solution to this growing problem, of course, is to redress the widening gap between the developed and the under-developed nations. This requires massive amounts of aid, debt relief, fair trade practices, the transfer of technological and entrepreneurial know-how, and total priority given to health, education and clean drinking water. It is a target to which people like Bob Geldof, who will be coming to Malta to give a concert on June 28, or Microsoft founder Bill Gates and his wife Melinda have dedicated themselves to reach, not least by putting pressure on the industrialised nations but also by setting an example which puts many national governments to shame.

And yet, the illegal, or even legal, emigration from the world's poorest countries - admittedly overpopulated in relation to their resources - is paradoxically depriving them of the able-bodied, perhaps even skilled, workforce which is essential if their economies are to take off one day.

Not all those who leave their impoverished countries do so for economic reasons; these are often compounded by religious or racial persecution, civil strife, torture or, as in Somalia's case, widespread anarchy. But grinding poverty would seem to be the main motive which drives so many thousands to undertake "voyages of death" if these mean the slightest chance of landing in a comparatively affluent country and starting a new life.

Most of them must be aware, too, that they stand a good chance of being rounded up and kept in detention centres where conditions, one should say, are not ideal. This applies to Malta, too, which has a more restrictive policy than neighbouring Italy, for example, but this is understandable, given the island's very limited resources and very small size.

As a short-term solution to the festering illegal immigration problem, a number of options are being considered but they are unlikely to stem the flow in meaningful numbers. The European Union has just pledged the equivalent of just under Lm1 million to operate sea patrols designed to stop and turn back immigrants from reaching the Canary Islands and Malta. Whether these will work remains to be seen.

Since most of those attempting to reach Sicily or mainland Italy (a proportion of whom involuntarily end up in Malta) do so by taking boats from Libya, it is in this country that a major effort must be made to stem the tide. The Libyans argue that their immigration problem is far worse than Italy's or Malta's, since thousands enter their territory through the porous desert borders, and that the country's 2,000-km coastline means that effective patrolling is impossible.

But the points of departure for most of these immigrants is well known by now, so efforts must be made to deal with the situation there. European aid should be channelled to Libya, if necessary, to deal with the problem at least until a regular immigration policy is worked out under which, for instance, countries like Italy but also other members of the European Union, can take a quota of immigrants every year who would help fill gaps in the labour market and - in Italy's case at least - even redress the demographic imbalance and reduce the welfare gap through national insurance contributions.

Certainly, other options could be studied to deal with the problem, but one option should never be considered by nations calling themselves civilised - that of racial hatred, intolerance and xenophobia, which many Maltese, sadly, are embracing as illegal immigrants continue to land on our shores.