The weaknesses of Operation Triton

Each new drama of illegal immigration revives the debate on the measures implemented to avoid them. And each time, the same failure finding. 2014 was a record year with 170,000 arrivals on Italian shores. 2015 promises to be worse.

3200 people perished at sea in 2014. According to the Italian Ministry of the Interior,

3,528 migrants arrived in January, 40% more than in January 2014.

For years, Italy is sounding the alarm and asking for help from its European partners. In autumn 2013, two shipwrecks off Lampedusa and Malta will make almost 400 dead. A tragedy that pushes Rome to react.

In October 2013, Italy created Mare Nostrum, a mission it assumes entirely financially and logistically. A rescue mission that saved 150,000 lives precisely in one year. So much so that the mission is sometimes criticized as favoring departures.

But it is his cost that it will end. € 9 million per month, totaling over one year nearly 114 million: that the operation cost to Italy.

Expensive too so it was abandoned in October 2014

In the aftermath, Europe takes over. In August, at a joint press conference, European Commissioner at the time of Internal Affairs and the Italian Minister of the Interior announced the creation of what was then called "Frontex plus": "The operation "Frontex plus" will substitute for Mare Nostrum, although it will not be the same extent. Mare Nostrum was a very ambitious project, and we do not know if we can afford to do exactly what Italy has done. "

It will eventually be renamed Operation Triton, cost 2.9 million euros per month. Already, Europe knows it has its limits. 19 countries participate but rotation. Only two per month are present. 2 large ships, 4 patrol boats, two aircraft, a helicopter. Insufficient to deal with tragedies like Monday.

Triton, unlike Mare Nostrum is not from a rescue mission. Its main purpose is the monitoring and control of borders, in Italian territorial waters.

But saving lives remains the priority of Frontex, repeatedly Triton ships were redirected to wreck areas. Too few to cope with the increasing number of accidents.