Drones ‘tested over Gaza’ have been reappropriated by the EU to monitor migrants in the Mediterranean
An MSF rescue crew comes across a boat that has left Libya in an attempt to reach Europe. Photograph: Sally HaydenA call came through saying the Libyans had arrived on the scene; desperate refugees and migrants began jumping from their overcrowded boat into the water to escape them – and still the crew waited. Until, eventually, the MSF search and rescue was called off and the case declared “closed”.
One aspect of the EU’s efforts to stop them is its use of Israeli drones. As far back as 2009, Human Rights Watchhow drones from the Heron series used by Israel have killed Palestinian civilians in Gaza. In 2020, the Guardian reported on abetween the EU, Airbus and two Israeli companies for the use of drones in the Mediterranean. The day Gatti consoled his disappointed crew, an unmanned Israeli Heron surveillance drone was on patrol – it flew five out of seven days that week.
Fabrice Leggeri, then executive director of Frontex – the European border agency – said in 2020 that it initially tested the Heron drones’ “capacity to detect and support the operational response to boats in distress, and therefore contribute to saving lives at sea”. The EU withdrew its maritime assets from the central Mediterranean in 2019. Aerial assets do not have the same capacity or legal requirement to rescue people in distress at sea when they are discovered.
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