Media Home
UN Web TV
UN Audiovisual Library
UN PhotoGENEVA / SHIPWRECK CENTRAL MEDITERRANEAN
Download
There is no media available to download.
Share
STORY: GENEVA / SHIPWRECK CENTRAL MEDITERRANEAN
TRT: 2:43
SOURCE: UNTV CH
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 9 MAY 2017 GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
1. Exterior, Palais des Nations
2. Wide Shot, Press Briefing Room
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Cecile Pouilly, Spokesperson, United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR):
“We received alarming information on a ship wreck that happened on Friday night when a rubber dingy sank after several hours of sailing. There were 132 people on board and 52 people were rescued and were disembarked in Sicily on Sunday. So we fear that 82 people might have disappeared or missing following this ship wreck.”
4. Med shot, journalists
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Cecile Pouilly, Spokesperson, United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR):
“The total number of people who are feared dead or missing while trying to cross from North Africa to Italy since the beginning of the year has now reached more than 1,300 people; and a total of over 43,000 people trying to cross the central Mediterranean to reach Italy since the beginning of the year.”
6. Close up, journalist
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Joel Millman, Spokesperson, International Organisation for Migration (IOM):
“We are reporting 6,612 people were rescued over the weekend that is a pretty busy weekend but it is not a record breaker. Our causality story is virtually identical to what my colleague just mentioned, we rely on what our staff is gathering from witnesses.”
8. Med shots, journalists
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Cecile Pouilly, Spokesperson, United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR):
“The NGO work is truly remarkable. So far since the beginning of the year they’ve been involved in over a third of all rescue operations. Actually they are saving thousands of lives and actually we know that the coast guard have also limited resources. So what they are doing is crucial and we insist that it is truly remarkable.”
10. Close up, spokesperson
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Joel Millman, Spokesperson, International Organisation for Migration (IOM):
“The reason the migrant numbers are down for total crossing is entirely due to the statistic of how many people are crossing from Turkey to Greece. Last year at this time there was over 155,000 for the year almost all of that occurred before late March, so what has changed is the central route. The central route is much busier in terms of total numbers than it was last year, at least 10,000 more than this time last year. And the deaths are at least 300 more than this time last year so those match. But if you look at the entire Mediterranean it looks like it was a busier year last year and it was because you include a whole second route on the eastern part of the country.”
12. Various shots, press conference
The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said nearly 250 people are missing and feared dead following two shipwrecks in the Mediterranean Sea in recent days.
UNHCR’s spokesperson Cecile Pouilly said today (9 May) to media representatives in Geneva “we received alarming information on a ship wreck that happened on Friday night when a rubber dingy sank after several hours of sailing”. She added “there were 132 people on board and 52 people were rescued and were disembarked in Sicily on Sunday. So we fear that 82 people might have disappeared or missing following this ship wreck.”
Another shipwreck occurred off the coast of Libya on Sunday, 7 May. One of UNHCR’s partner agency, the International Medical Corps, has reported that 163 people were feared missing and dead. One woman and six men were rescued by the Libyan Coast Guards.
UNHCR’s Cecile Pouilly noted that “the total number of people who are feared dead or missing while trying to cross from North Africa to Italy since the beginning of the year has now reached more than 1,300 people; and a total of over 43,000 people trying to cross the central Mediterranean to reach Italy since the beginning of the year.”
Joel Millman, spokesperson for the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), said “we are reporting 6,612 people were rescued over the weekend that is a pretty busy weekend but it is not a record breaker. Our causality story is virtually identical to what my colleague just mentioned, we rely on what our staff is gathering from witnesses.”
UNHCR’s spokesperson commended the work of NGO’s for rescue at sea operations. Cecile Pouilly said “the NGO work is truly remarkable. So far since the beginning of the year they’ve been involved in over a third of all rescue operations. Actually they are saving thousands of lives and actually we know that the coast guard have also limited resources. So what they are doing is crucial and we insist that it is truly remarkable.”
IOM provided some updated numbers of migrants crossing the Mediterranean this year. Joel Millman said “the reason the migrant numbers are down for total crossing is entirely due to the statistic of how many people are crossing from Turkey to Greece”. Millman added that “last year at this time there was over 155,000 for the year almost all of that occurred before late March, so what has changed is the central route. The central route is much busier in terms of total numbers than it was last year, at least 10,000 more than this time last year.”
Millman also said “the deaths are at least 300 more than this time last year so those match. But if you look at the entire Mediterranean it looks like it was a busier year last year and it was because you include a whole second route on the eastern part of the country.”
IOM’s spokesperson said that they received information confirmed by the Italian coast guard, that smugglers tend to put more people on the boat and that they tend to use lower quality vessels to transport the migrants.
