Alarm Phone fears yet another deadly shipwreck in the Central Mediterranean

Alarm Phone fears that yet another shipwreck occurred during the night of 19 December. Against the silence and indifference of the authorities, we demand answers! Families searching for their missing loved ones have the right to the truth. Below is a reconstruction of the case and an urgent request to the authorities to provide information in order to understand what happened and clarify responsibilities.

At 14:00 CET on 19 December, Alarm Phone was informed about a boat which departed from Zuwara on the evening of 18 December, carrying 117 people. According to the information received, the departure had taken place around 20:00 local time the previous evening. 

We repeatedly attempted to contact the boat via satellite phone, without success. Relevant coast guards and NGOs were alerted, despite not having a GPS position.

Throughout the entire day, we continued trying to reach the boat via satellite phone, again without success.

When we contacted the Italian Coast Guard, they confirmed receiving our email but immediately ended the call without providing any further information or reassurance.

The so-called Libyan Coast Guard told us by phone that they had neither rescued nor intercepted any boats on 18 or 19 December.

On the evening of 21 December, we received information that Tunisian fishermen had found a single survivor on a wooden boat. He reportedly stated that he had been on a journey departing from Zuwara two days earlier and that he was the only survivor. 

According to his testimony, only a few hours after departure the weather deteriorated dramatically, with winds reaching up to 40 km/h. He was extremely weak and we could not get a detailed account what happened. The survivor was reportedly transferred to a hospital in Tunisia by the fishermen.

Alarm Phone has tried to verify this information but has not yet been able to fully confirm it.

We attempted to establish direct contact with both the survivor and the fishermen who rescued him in order to better understand what happened and where the shipwreck occurred, but so far without success.

On 21 and 22 December, we called the Tunisian Coast Guard countless times, first to urge them to deploy search and rescue assets to look for additional survivors or recover bodies, and later to request updated information.

Both the so-called Libyan and Tunisian Coast Guards repeatedly told us that they did not bring anyone ashore during these days. We were also told that the weather, especially during the night between 18 and 19 December, was so bad that it was “impossible” to go to sea.

During the 18th to 21st of December no boat from libya arrived to the island of Lampedusa. 

NGOs present in the wider area at the time (Sea-Watch 5 and ResQPeople), could not search for the boat, either because they had already left the area before the presumed shipwreck (Sea-Watch 5) or did not sail far enough south to encounter the boat (ResqPeople).

On 22 December, Sea-Watch’s Seabird 3 conducted an aerial search in the area where the shipwreck is believed to have occurred, but found neither survivors nor visible traces of a recent shipwreck.

Additionally, Frontex aircraft Osprey 4 (HEX: 4D2376) flew in the area on 20 December, twice on 21 December, and again on 22 December. Whether Frontex detected anything related to this boat remains unknown to us.

Tunisian civil society also worked tirelessly to try to trace the potential survivor, but all institutions remained silent. This silence reflects the shrinking of civic space, which has continued to worsen in recent months.

While the authorities remain silent and indifferent, we ask:

• What did Frontex see, and why is this information not publicly disclosed?
• Why were no proactive search and rescue operations launched once the boat went missing?
• Why was no information shared despite repeated alerts?
• What has happened to the potential survivor? Why was it impossible for the Tunisian civil society to find him? In the past, Alarm Phone has already documented cases in which shipwreck survivors were deported to the desert without even being taken to a hospital.

Our rage is directed at the European border regime, whose policies of deterrence, abandonment, and criminalisation of migration systematically produce death at sea. This shipwreck, like so many before, is not an accident. It is the result of deliberate non-assistance, racist border violence, and the refusal to guarantee freedom of movement and the right to life.

No borders. No deaths. No silence.