Dangerous Migrant Smuggling Routes Flourish In Lawless Libya

[Purveyor]

By Aidan Lewis and Ahmed Elumami

TRIPOLI (Reuters) - After a flurry of boat departures that sent hundreds of migrants to their deaths in the Mediterranean, survivors told police they had been kept for weeks on one meal a day in holding houses near the Libyan shore.

Then they boarded the rubber or wooden vessels, but only those co-opted to run or drive the boats were given life-jackets, according to accounts given to Italian police.

As calmer summer weather begins, European officials who struck a deal with Turkey to block crossings to Greece have been scrambling for ways to shut down flows on the other major sea route into the EU from Libya.

They hope a U.N.-sponsored government that arrived in Tripoli in March will bring stability, and the EU last week agreed to help to train Libya's coastguard.

But Libyan officials describe themselves as under-resourced and helpless against powerful smugglers who go about their trade with impunity, adapting swiftly to new conditions.

MORE...

https://www.yahoo.com/news/dangerous-migrant-smuggling-routes-flourish-lawless-libya-135517919.html?ref=gs

[leveymg]

1. I guess there are no more refugees in Libya. Every one is just a "dangerous migrant" now.

[libdem4life]

2. Definitely not our finest moment. But there is no political responsibility...

so they say. Not. Doesn't Syria need some help, too?

The US needs to STOP playing at being the Global Police. Now which candidate would most likely follow that line of thinking?

[Jesus Malverde]

3. What Libya needs is a strong leader to keep the multiethnic multicultural country together...nt

[MisterP]

4. Clinton: they need more guns and money; then Libya will be everything Syria could've been!