The Mediterranean: A sea of death

It was a balmy spring night on the Mediterranean. The sea was calm and the bright, white moon was lighting the way for Captain Giuseppe Margiotta. He was out on his 30-metre boat, the Antonio Sirrato, fishing for prawns with his crew. This has been his life for 35 years.

They were 40 miles from the coast of Libya, a lawless country at war with itself since the fall of Gaddafi in 2011. The country has become a launch pad for overcrowded boats ferrying migrants and refugees to Captain Margiotta’s homeland, Sicily.

The Mediterranean Sea would normally bring the Captain happiness and calm. His peace was interrupted on this night, in mid-April, by a call from the Italian navy. “They were asking whether we could see a new object on the radar. We thought it was them, but they said it wasn’t. They were 20 miles away,” Captain Margiotta explained.

He was suddenly surrounded by the sound of helicopters deployed by the Italian navy. They turned on their spotlight. A towboat, he said was armed like a war boat, came out of the darkness. “They told us to take our fishing nets out of the sea and leave. It was a Libyan boat.”

Fishing has become a dangerous business on the Mediterranean Sea. Gaddafi’s fall has opened up a power vacuum that has attracted the likes of terrorist groups, such as the so-called Islamic State, and some Libyan militiamen have extended their influence to the sea. Sicilian fishing crews said they now fear thugs might try to seize their fishing boats and everyone onboard.

Another problem is that the Libyan Government has maintained Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s controversial stance in regards to territorial waters. It claims not only the 12 nautical miles from its coast, which is considered the standard in the Mediterranean, but it includes the entire Gulf of Sirte and then a further “exclusive fishing zone”. That means Libya’s sea border can stretch more than 60 miles from some coastal points. Captain Margiotta’s family have made a living from these waters since he was a child. He is determined to continue the tradition despite the threats.

Captain Margiotta was disturbed, but not deterred, by his encounter with the Libyan towboat. The team continued fishing. The tension onboard was cut by another call: this time it was from the Italian coast guard. “We need your help,” they said. “You need to help us.” Captain Margiotta was given a set of coordinates and ordered to get there as soon as he could — at any cost, he was told.

“It was like a movie, like a war. There were low-flying helicopters, rubber boats, coast guard boats, navy boats, other fishing boats, even the Maltese coast guard,” he said.

“They told us that a boat filled with migrants hit another boat and the boat sank. There were dead bodies everywhere. They asked us to go around and try to find some survivors. So we started to go very slowly to see what we could find. It was still night and dark. After 15 minutes, we saw something. It was a boy.”

Hours passed and the sun started to rise — and it revealed a sea of death. “There were clothes everywhere: female clothing, children’s clothing, slippers. We were one of the few boats able to retrieve a few bodies. I remember when we were retrieving them: they still looked alive. They were dead,” Captain Margiotta explained.

He stared out the window. His eyes started to fill with tears and his lip quivered. He lowered his head while he pulled on the edge of his hat to hide his face. A few seconds passed, and he broke down.

Captain Margiotta continued to tell his story. “My men saw me crying and asked me, “Why are you crying?” I said, “It’s not because I’m tender.” His face hardened and he clenched his fist. “It’s the rage that makes me cry.”

“Why these things have to happen? I’ve had a lot of personal tragedies and I still didn’t cry. Children have no guilt at all. These people only want a better life and now we are retrieving their bodies from the sea like tuna.”

This is not the first migrant tragedy that has rocked the Sicilian fishing community. Around 22,000 refugees and migrants have drowned in the Mediterranean in the last 15 years. Fishermen are often told to take part in search-and-rescue missions — and it is usually at their own financial cost.

Captain Margiotta’s anger is directed at European leaders. “If something like this happens again, they should go see what it looks like, then meet each other around the table. I want to see what they do and what they say. I want it to be possible to stop the human traffic. But behind, there is a dark side, and even the politicians have an interest in it.”

Captain Margiotta’s gaze hardened when asked whether this “dark side” — the tragedies and the Libyan threat — are enough to make him give up fishing.

“Our fathers and our grandfathers: they showed us how to fish in these zones. Do you know how many boats, how many flipped boats we see in these zones? The Libyans do everything possible to send us away from here, just so they can do whatever they want. I thought many times that this has become too dangerous, but it’s my job,” he said.

“Now I have another job. I retrieve dead bodies from the sea.”

Originally broadcast on DW English