APRIL 23, 2015
Rescuers have struggled to recover bodies from an April 19 shipwreck 60 miles off the Libyan coast and 120 miles south of the Italian island of Lampedusa. They have given up on finding survivors. Up to 900 men, women, and children are feared dead after the capsizing of their 65-foot vessel, which had embarked from Libya en route to Italy carrying migrants from Syria, Afghanistan, and sub-Saharan Africa.
In the days after this tragedy, French President François Hollandecondemned the “terrorists” who put migrants in “ships they know are rotten,” and Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi denounced the human traffickers as “slave drivers of the 21st century.” Smugglers — who have developed a lucrative business exploiting the misery and despair of hundreds of thousands attempting to reach European shores — certainly deserve blame for this tragedy. But they also provide a convenient target for European politicians whose failed immigration policies and lack of willingness to address this crisis bear much responsibility.
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