Archbishop Charles Scicluna and Lifeline captain Claus-Peter Reisch on Wednesday were among those who paid tribute to the 850 people who died in an attempt to reach Italy from Libya in 2015.
A long-awaited memorial plaque was laid down at the Addolorata Cemetery, where 24 dead migrants had been buried in April of that year.
“All humanity weighs the same at eternity’s gates.“
— MISSION LIFELINE (@SEENOTRETTUNG) May 15, 2019
Our heartfelt solidarity with all those lost at sea who will never have a grave to mourn at. This morning, we stood shoulder to shoulder with Maltese civil society to lay a memorial for the victims of the 2015 shipwrecks. pic.twitter.com/LZYLldMLt4
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Despite an extensive rescue operation, only 28 people survived. Twenty-four corpses were brought to Malta and the remaining 800 were believed to have drowned when their crowded boat capsized some 30 miles off the Libyan coast.
On that fateful morning, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat had told party supporters in Marsa: “They are literally trying to find people alive among the dead floating in the water".