DISTRESS calls from at least four refugee boats were ignored by Europe’s maritime authorities this Easter. 

Between Good Friday and today, refugee hotline organisation Alarm Phone was in contact with four boats with an estimated 47, 55, 71 and 85 people on board. 

Despite the first two boats having been inside Malta’s search-and-rescue zone since Saturday, the authorities did not respond to their pleas for help.

The Aita Maria, a ship operated by Basque charity Humanitarian Maritime Salvage (SMH), called on the Maltese authorities for urgent assistance today after it located the first boat. 

The vessel was sailing from Syracuse on the Italian island of Sicily to Spain without its rescue and medical crew on board when it received the boat’s position, the organisation said in a morning tweet. 

“The weather is getting worse,” SMH said in a morning tweet. “We phoned Malta again. No answer. [We are] still waiting for instruction.” 

The Aita Maria handed out life jackets, food and water to the 47 refugees was, as the Star went to press, had waiting for a Maltese Armed Forces helicopter to pick them up from their position. 

Alarm Phone said this afternoon that the second boat had made it to Italy. 

“While EU authorities fail to provide any info, migrant communities confirmed to us that one of the boats we lost contact with [with about 71 people on board] arrived autonomously in Ragusa, Italy,” the activists said.

“We are glad they survived this long journey amidst EU authorities’ attempts to let them drown.”

No contact has been made with the boats carrying 55 and 85 people on board since Easter Sunday and Good Friday respectively. 

German migrant-rescue charity Sea Watch reported sighting a capsized boat on Sunday. It is not known if this was one of the two missing boats. 

Sea Watch questioned the European border & coastguard agency Frontex after images of one of its planes’ flight paths appeared to show that it had circled the last known locations of all four missing boats. 

“Frontex spotted four rubber boats, likely [Sunday’s] Alarm Phone cases,” Sea Watch tweeted. 

“One of them capsized. We have to assume that it sank with people on board, since there is no knowledge of a rescue or interception. Europe left them alone to die at Easter. Again.”

Meanwhile, the Alan Kurdi, a rescue ship that has been carrying 150 refugees for seven days, remains at sea without a port of safety. 

“[On Sunday] evening, our ship Alan Kurdi received another supply delivery from Italy,” Sea Eye, the German charity that operates the ship, tweeted this afternoon. 

“There are indications that the guests will be transferred onto another ship. When and where is still unclear. 149 guests still need a safe port.”

Axel Steier, co-founder of refugee rescue charity Mission Lifeline, told the Star that the Mediterranean this Easter was a catastrophe caused by “fortress Europe.” 

“Germany has stopped the voluntary admission of rescued people. Malta and Italy close the ports,” Mr Steier said.  

“In Greece, refugees are shot at at the border and locked up in open-air prisons and other prisons. Frontex flies over boats in distress and does not rescue people. Military ships and merchant ships do not intervene. 

“Libyan militias shoot on behalf of the EU countries and kidnap people to war. Countless people are dying while Europeans deliberately do not do everything possible to rescue.”