The evening of Wednesday 12 June was a missed opportunity for those who did not participate in the meeting organized by the Mediterranea Saving Humans association. In the Montanari room there were about thirty people, who had arrived to listen to the testimonies of the activists from the sea and land missions and to welcome the Varese ground crew.
Mediterranea was born in the summer of 2018 after the tragedies in the Mediterranean and the policy of closed ports. At sea the Mare Jonio ship sails between Libya and the Sicily Channel to monitor the area and rescue people in difficulty. To the ground Mediterranea is on the land migratory routes, in Bosnia, along the Balkan route, in Ukraine to support the population affected by the war.
There are approximately 40 Ground Crews distributed across Italy, Europe and the United States and the objective is to nourish the presence also in Varese, a border land for many reasons.
We said at the beginning of the article that it was a missed opportunity for those who weren’t there, because listen and see images of rescues at sea, hear from a doctor’s voice what the consequences are on the bodies and minds of the people saved from shipwrecks after years of wanderings through deserts and Libyan prisons it could have been an opportunity to open your mind and learn about a reality that we hear about on TV with too often propagandistic tones, without the right awareness.
The president of Mediterranea Saving Humans Laura Marmorale intervened via video to pull the stringsthen followed by Marcello Medici, activist from Formigine with experience mainly in Ukraine. And then the images, shocking and touching, projected by Danny Castiglione, head of mission of Mediterranea Saving Humans on the Ionian Sea in the last mission in April. Equally strong are the words of Francesco Nastasio, doctor, active in sea rescue, but also in land missions between the Balkan route and Ukraine, who explained what the consequences are from a health point of view for the many people who are saved by the Mediterranea missions. It’s still Francesco Cafagna, activist who is part of the Milan ground crew and is also responsible for the “underground railway” project which aims to help migrants in transit through our territory.
Finally, space for the Varese ground crew, inaugurated on the evening of Wednesday 12 June by Marco Zangirolami and Giusi Lo Verso, organizer of the evening. There will be other opportunities to learn about Mediterannea Saving Humans and realize the work that activists put in place every day, in the most diverse and complex contexts, with a primary objective: saving and protecting people.
For information www.mediterranearescue.org or [email protected].
