Mr. Sam Taylor:

I thank the Chairman and members of the committee for affording us this opportunity to speak to them today about the search and rescue missions in the central Mediterranean. My name is Sam Taylor and I am the director of Médecins Sans Frontières, Doctors Without Borders, in Ireland. I am joined by Dr. Conor Kenny, who has recently returned from one of our vessels in the central Mediterranean. Médecins Sans Frontières is an independent, medical, humanitarian organisation that delivers emergency aid to people affected by armed conflict, epidemics, natural disasters and exclusion from health care. We offer assistance based on need, irrespective of race, religion, ideology or political affiliations and our actions are guided by medical ethics and the principles of neutrality and impartiality. We are 96% funded by private donors and do not rely on government funds for our activities. We opened our office in Ireland in 2006 and to date have placed more than 150 Irish staff in MSF projects all around the world, from Afghanistan to Uganda. We go where we are needed, to where the patients are. Unfortunately, that now includes the Mediterranean Sea.

MSF started its search and rescue operations in the Mediterranean in April 2015, following the decision of the European Union and Italy to discontinue Mare Nostrum, the joint large-scale search and rescue mission led by the Italian Navy. At the time, it appeared that Europe was prepared to let many people fleeing war, poverty and oppression die at sea. We in MSF took the difficult decision that we could not stand back and watch from the shore as thousands of men, women and children drowned while trying to reach Europe. Death at sea continues at an alarming rate and the numbers of deaths are comparable to what Médecins Sans Frontières is used to seeing in the war zones in which we operate.

Our work, responding to displacement in Europe over the past two years, has led us to set up projects in the south of the continent as well as along what became known as the Balkan route. From reception centres to refugee camps, we have established projects to respond to the health and medical needs of people on the move. While the recent EU-Turkey deal has meant that fewer people are attempting the journey along the Balkan route, the journey has only become more dangerous for people still attempting to cross. To date, MSF teams in the central Mediterranean have rescued or assisted over 30,000 people in distress on over 200 operations. In 2017 alone, we have rescued and assisted more than 9,000 individuals.

According to data from the International Organization for Migration, IOM, the number of people who died trying to reach Europe by crossing the Mediterranean has reached an all-time high with over 5,000 reported deaths in 2016. This year is shaping up to be another deadly year, with more than 2,170 deaths so far, according to the IOM. However, these figures betray the reality of this crisis as the actual number of deaths is likely to be much worse. We have no idea how many dinghies overloaded with terrified passengers set sail from Libya in the direction of Italy each day and sink without trace. This morning, Dr. Conor Kenny, an MSF Ireland field worker who spent three months on board our vessel, the MV Aquarius, in the central Mediterranean, will outline his very difficult and challenging first-hand experiences of providing medical care to those rescued aboard the vessel.

Last week, the Italian Government signalled to the European Commission that it may move to block foreign-flagged vessels from docking in Italian ports due to the strain on their systems coping with the rescues. Search and rescue is a desperately needed emergency response but our work at sea is just a sticking plaster on a gaping wound. Our search and rescue operation is not the solution to this ongoing crisis, nor is it the cause, as some have claimed. After Dr. Kenny’s testimony, we will briefly conclude by outlining a number of our key concerns related to search and rescue operations for this committee to take into consideration, before we open the floor to any questions members may have.

Once again, I thank the committee for this timely opportunity and I ask Dr. Kenny to speak.