REFUGEES are threatening to jump overboard from an NGO rescue ship that has been waiting for Italy and Malta to respond to its persistent requests for a port of safety.

Since last Thursday the Ocean Viking’s crew has rescued 180 people in four operations within the Maltese and Italian search and rescue region.

Frederic Penard director of operations for SOS Mediterranee, the charity with operates the Ocean Viking, warned today that the ship has been left in limbo.

“We have sent five requests to Italian and Maltese maritime authorities for a port of disembarkation to be assigned. We have received no response but two negative answers so far.

“Survivors have told our teams they had spent two to five days at sea before being rescued by the Ocean Viking. This means that some of the 180 survivors have been in precarious conditions at sea since more than eight days. This situation is unbearable.”

Mr Penard called on the EU to restart the 2019 Malta agreement, an emergency mechanism that saw other EU member states host refugees rescued at sea and brought to Italy or Malta, that was seemingly abandoned at the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.

“This lack of solidarity and burden-sharing among EU member states,” Mr Penard said, “has direct implications for the 180 survivors who risked their lives to flee violence and abuse in war-torn Libya.

“Tensions on board our vessel are rising, with several survivors threatening to jump overboard. Many have suffered sun and fuel burns during the time they spent on unseaworthy boats on the open sea.

“A person had to be evacuated after his medical condition deteriorated and we have a pregnant woman on board.

“We have heard from survivors how in a detention centre in Libya guards beat a survivor on his leg with a steel stick until they broke his foot.

“Countless people have told us they tried to flee Libya several times, were intercepted by the Libyan Coastguard at sea and brought back to detention in a never-ending vicious circle.

“These people risked their lives to flee violence and abuse in war-torn Libya. They need to disembark in a place of safety without further delay — only then will their rescue be complete.

“The support of EU member states has made a difference in the past. It must not stop now.”

Meanwhile, the EU-supported Libyan Coastguard returned 197 people that attempted to escape the war-torn country by crossing the Mediterranean today, the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) announced this morning.

IOM Libya’s chief of mission Federico Soda warned in an interview with Vatican News on Wednesday that conditions inside the country’s detention centres “make it impossible [for migrants] to be detained in a dignified manner” and that they were “often linked to criminal networks.”

Elsewhere, the refugee distress hotline organisation Alarm Phone warned this morning that it has not been able to re-establish contact with a boat carrying 30 people, including children, 30 nautical miles off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa since 7pm Wednesday.

“A night has passed and we have [had] no contact with the people in distress … Authorities in Malta and Italy [have still not provided] info about the people,” Alarm Phone tweeted today.

“We fear they have been abandoned at sea. [Italian Coastguard] and [Armed Forces Malta] act now!”