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Labour tears into ‘shameful’ Med rescue mission snub

LABOUR backbencher Mark Lazarowicz slammed the government’s “shameful” refusal yesterday to support future search-and-rescue missions to save desperate migrants trying to reach Europe from North Africa.

An Italian mission currently operating in the Mediterranean is being wound up, with a more limited European Union border security operation being launched on November 1.

Earlier this month the government sparked outrage when it claimed search-and-rescue operations might encourage more illegal immigrants to attempt the crossing.

Responding to an urgent parliamentary question yesterday from Mr Lazarowicz, Immigration Minister James Brokenshire said Britain had “agreed to a request from Frontex, the EU’s border management agency to deploy a debriefing expert in support of the new Frontex Operation Triton off the southern Italian coast.

“We stand ready to consider any further request for UK support for the new Frontex operation,” he added.

Mr Lazarowicz said: “This policy is shameful.

“Surely when we know that hundreds of our fellow human beings face terrible death and it is in our power to do something about it, it is our moral duty to act and, if we fail to do so, are we not complicit in their deaths?”

Lib Dem MP Sarah Teather called the decision “absurd and deeply unethical.”

She said: “We can’t wash our hands of these people, Pontius Pilate-style.”

Labour’s Diane Abbott said the decision represented a “new low.”

She said: “Of course the solution to these problems lies in North Africa, but consciously pursuing a policy that will allow more people to drown should play no part in protecting Europe’s borders. We will look back in shame to this decision.”

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