Mr. Sam Taylor:

I will start and I will hand over to Dr. Kenny for the eyewitness information. In response to Deputy Crowe's question about the potential closure of Italian ports, that is obviously very concerning. We run missions of approximately 72 hours in order to get people back to disembark with them in Italy but if that time is increased it will mean more deaths at sea because we will be spending less time looking for people and picking them up. As Deputy Crowe said, Italy has been absorbing a huge burden. We are quite concerned about the discussion in terms of the code of conduct around NGOs. We have not received any official notification on this matter yet but preventing NGOs from disembarking in the closest safe harbours will increase the danger.

In terms of the other EU countries, we believe very strongly that people should follow Ireland's lead and provide humanitarian maritime assistance, which is what this country has been doing. It is the only EU country to do so. We very much respect and admire that, but we are concerned that this activity is moving more towards prevention of people getting into Europe and returning them back to Libya. The conditions in those detention centres are completely appalling. As Dr. Kenny outlined, we are seeing victims of torture, trauma and all kinds of things. At MSF we believe very strongly that what is needed is more search and rescue capacity, not turning people back. As Dr. Kenny outlined as well, we have seen smugglers firing into the air and stealing from the people that are on their boats so it is an extremely challenging situation.

In terms of NGOs being a pull factor, they are not. An academic study was done by Goldsmiths college two weeks ago that showed that irrespective of whether there are ships there people are going to go to sea. In terms of responding to Deputy O'Sullivan's question about why we rescue people, if 5,000 people were dying of Ebola we would feel the need to respond. That is an unacceptable amount of people to be dying because they want to cross a border, which is not a particularly good reason. From a humanitarian medical perspective that is why we feel we have to put those three boats into the water there, but we are not the solution. The solution lies with individual European states. We do not know what the solution is. Compared to the weight of the European Union we are a relatively small organisation. We know that sending people back is not the correct response. We do not differentiate between whether people are economic migrants or they are fleeing Darfur, Somalia or Eritrea. People do not get on those boats lightly. I have Syrian friends who have made the journey. They know what they are getting into. They are fully informed of the risks in Libya and on the way. That is not something we would necessarily differentiate.

In terms of co-ordination of services, all the activities are co-ordinated by the Maritime Security Council, MSC, out of Rome. We are not cowboys. We run watches on deck where we look for people but we are told where to go, as is the Irish Naval Service and the other NGO boats. All the rescues are co-ordinated by Rome. Dr. Kelly can provide more details about this. We follow the instructions.

In terms of the distance, on five occasions over the past three years we have entered into Libyan territorial waters up to 1 nautical mile, but that was to save lives. We could see people drowning in front of us and we felt obliged to save them. We were told to go there by Rome, so we went. Just to make it very clear; there is no contact whatsoever between Médecins Sans Frontières and any smuggler. All the activities are co-ordinated out of Rome. We are directed in terms of what to do.

There is a legal obligation on any vessel to go to the aid of another vessel in distress. That is not something we made up. What we are doing is adding capacity. The commercial vessels that were previously taking a lot of the slack on this, aftermare nostrumfinished, complained to the European Union, saying the volume was too high. It is not that we are providing an ambulance service or a taxi service. There is a legal obligation based on the laws of the sea which dictate that vessels in distress must be attended to by other vessels in the area.

In terms of funding, Médecins Sans Frontières stopped taking European Union funding in June, because of the EU-Turkey deal to which Ireland was a party. We stopped taking Irish Aid money at the same time. The boats are another illustration of that, as is sending people back to Libya. There is a very dangerous movement now to prevent people from seeking asylum. People have the right to seek asylum, to flee war, to flee persecution and natural disaster. We believe that putting borders and barriers up, whether they be in Libya or on the Balkan route, is a worrying development of outsourcing European borders. We understand that Europe has a massive problem with this but we feel that people should have the right to flee Syria and Eritrea. We feel quite strongly on that.

The work of the Irish Naval Service is something that is very respected both by Médecins Sans Frontières and by the other people doing this work but we remain concerned that the work should stick, as it has for the past three years, to humanitarian search and rescue, rather than looking to go on border control missions, which we feel sends a very concerning message.