'EU should stop Italy forcing migrants to Libya'

The European Union should demand that Italy stop forcing African migrant boats back to Libya, where would-be asylum seekers are consigned to inhumane camps, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said yesterday.

Under a deal with Tripoli, Italy has been intercepting migrant boats in international waters since May and returning them, without screening for asylum applications, to Libya, which has not signed international treaties on refugees.

The UN says three-quarters of irregular migrants arriving by sea in Italy last year applied for asylum, and half of them were accepted. Many were from war-torn Somalia or repressive states like Eritrea.

"Italy flouts its legal obligations by summarily returning boat migrants to Libya," said Bill Frelick, refugee policy direct at HRW and author of the report. "The EU should demand that Italy comply with its obligations by halting these returns to Libya."

In its 92-page report, HRW said migrants testified to brutal beatings and overcrowded and unsanitary conditions in Libyan camps. One migrant said a companion was shot dead by Libyans when their boat was intercepted leaving the north African coast.

The New York-based rights group said the EU border agency Frontex had even coordinated some returns. It urged EU states to refuse to participate in any Frontex operations that resulted in the return of migrants to Libya.

The EU began talks with Tripoli last year aimed at reaching a deal that would include the return of illegal migrants entering the bloc from Libya. But at a meeting of EU ministers in Brussels to discuss asylum policy yesterday, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres said there was no system in place in Libya to protect would-be asylum seekers.

The crackdown on illegal immigration by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's conservative government has already opened a rift within his coalition.

It also prompted a row last month with the European Commission, which has sought an investigation into the repatriations to Libya after 73 migrants died aboard a dinghy which drifted in the Mediterranean for three weeks.