Giletti remarks belie tradition

TV presenter Massimo Giletti, speaking during RaiDue’s Domenica In, Italy’s most popular Sunday TV show, said the reason why the Italian island of Lampedusa is having so many landings by illegal immigrants is because the Maltese are shooting at the boatloads of migrants.

This statement, though completely naïve, is simply ridiculous and can only be explained by the impromptu nature of the comments made by an Italian TV presenter who is obviously unprepared on the subject and “shoots” from the hip. His comments are nothing if not slanderous accusations against the people of Malta who, in view of their history of sacrifice, deserve the respect of the whole of Europe.

There is nothing to add, therefore, to what has already been said by Malta’s ambassador in Italy, Walter Balzan, who telephoned during the programme, nor to the excuses proffered by Efisio Marras, the Italian ambassador to Malta; however, the problem of how to deal with those escaping the war in Libya will soon become an urgent one for Malta too.

It is pointless now to explain to the presenter that the island of Lampedusa is only about 130 kilometres from the Tunisian coast and that they land there because it happens to be the nearest Italian territory before they disperse throughout Europe. Instead, one needs to point out to our friend Sig. Giletti that it is quite possible that boatloads of war refugees from Libya will arrive in Malta. They could number in their thousands – people who want to get to Europe, rather than to settle or find work in Malta.

Are we talking here of war refugees or illegal immigrants? Would they be persons who are somehow compromised because of their association with the Gaddafi regime, former mercenaries, or migrants pushing through the frontier with Chad?

There is certainly no easy solution to the problem, which affects the culture of Europe as a whole, a culture which first found its identity in the churches and cathedrals and later in the Enlightenment.

In Malta’s case, what could happen is what is already happening these days in Lampedusa, when the peaceful inhabitants, for centuries known for their hospitality, are insisting that “our patience has reached its limit”.

Sig. Giletti probably does not know that the man of the sea is obliged to rescue any vessel with people on board which finds itself in difficulty and not to shoot. An incident during World War II in the Atlantic is quite illuminating in this regard. The Italian submariner Salvatore Todaro, who was born in Sicily, after the sinking of a steamship, approached the stricken vessel and picked up the 26 survivors, towing their raft for four days. When the tow rope snapped, Mr Todaro did not hesitate to take the survivors on board his submarine till he made them land safely in the Azores.

He was severely pulled up by the German Admiral Karl Doenitz because his behaviour had jeopardised his own safety and that of his crew, since he had navigated on the surface, exposing the submarine to enemy air attacks.

Mr Todaro replied that his decision was inspired by the ages-old civility of the people of the Mediterranean. This civility is common to all men of the sea and does not change, even if Malta and Italy found themselves at war with the people of Libya or Tunisia. Sig. Giletti only deserves forgiveness for his superficial and baseless remarks.