Vittorio Alessandro is a retired admiral of the Italian Coast Guard, the corps that manages the Italian Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC), as well as the Port Captaincies. This interview was carried out on 18 June 2024 as part of the EU-funded SOLROUTES project (https://www.solroutes.eu – ERC Advanced Grant 101053836). The views and opinions expressed are, however, those of the authors only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or European Research Council. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible. The unabridged Italian version of this interview was published by Melting Pot Europa at https://www.meltingpot.org/2024/07/la-guardia-costiera-italiana-soccorsi-in-mare-e-banalita-del-male/ on 25 July 2024.

Paolo Cuttitta (P.C.) & Luca Queirolo Palmas (L.Q.P.): On several occasions, you’ve been critical of the Italian authorities’ Search and Rescue (SAR) practices at sea. Can you briefly describe your career in the Coast Guard?

Vittorio Alessandro (V.A.): I joined the Coast Guard in 1981 and served in it for over 30 years, mainly dealing with maritime safety. As the head of external relations, I dealt directly with the issue of migration flows, particularly in 2011, the year of the so-called Arab Spring and the mass arrivals of migrants. I left the Coast Guard in 2012 to chair the Cinque Terre National Park and Marine Protected Area.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: How has the debate on interpreting the concept of ›distress‹ developed over time within the Italian Coast Guard?

V.A.: The Coast Guard is a military corps. Thus, their activities are not the result of a debate, but rather, they stem from the application of the law. Throughout my career, I’ve seen rescue operations that were always based on a very broad understanding of ›distress‹, as provided by the law. Saving human lives at sea is the very reason for the Coast Guard’s existence. We were always advised, right from when we were attending the Academy, that we should never misjudge a situation by downplaying danger but rather by overestimating it. We were also told to never underestimate a dangerous situation because we would be liable for the consequences. That’s why we’ve always understood danger, ›distress‹, to be well-founded, even when there’s no apparent risk. For example, when a pleasure boat is late returning to port or is presumed to be in trouble, we go out to sea, and when it turns out that there is no danger, we can just return to port. This precautionary approach is also shared by other authorities – Fire Brigade, Medical Rescue, Carabinieri, and Civil Defense. All of them have a duty to intervene before damage occurs, as soon as they feel that something might be happening. However, over time, we’ve witnessed a shift in focus on the assessment of danger at sea. Specifically, with regard to rescuing migrants, the concept of ›distress‹ has become increasingly blurred. Is the boat floating? Yes, it is. Is it sailing? Yes, it is. Then it’s not in distress, even if it’s overloaded, even if it’s not sufficiently stable, even if the weather and sea conditions are uncertain or bound to get worse, even if there are no captains or means of rescue. In situations such as these, it’s become widely accepted that there must be an imminent danger to talk about ›distress‹ and, therefore, an urgent need to carry out a rescue operation. When there are no imminent or concluded tragedies, the Coast Guard carries out border police actions, and these cases are classified as migratory phenomena that don’t require the Port Captaincies’ intervention. Migration policies certainly represent a fundamental institutional action, but they should be pursued ashore when the rescue operation is over, and lives have been saved. Regarding the concept of ›distress‹, the elements I was talking about (unstable boats, large numbers of people on board, uncertain sea conditions, the lack of means of rescue, and so on) are listed in EU Regulation 656 of 2014 which, in its definition of the actions of Frontex (the EU Coast Guard Agency), specifically defines ›distress‹. Contravening this definition of ›distress‹ means breaking the law.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: So, just monitoring from a distance isn’t sufficient for these conditions to be fulfilled.

V.A.: It may only be appropriate in certain cases when transshipment is not possible due to excessive numbers of shipwrecked people or is not advisable due to technical difficulties. If the boat is able to sail, the rescue unit sails alongside it while keeping the situation under control. In Pylos, on 14 June 2023, a boat in distress was towed by a Greek patrol boat to the Italian SRR (Search and Rescue Region), resulting in the death of 600 people. That operation breached the basic rules of rescue and seamanship.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: There was a period when Italian and EU military patrols used to venture into the soon-to-be-declared Libyan SRR. Since the end of 2016, there has been a reduction in both the number of patrols and their radius of action.

V.A.: It was a political choice; all of this was done so Libya could have an internationally recognized SRR. The maritime community accepted Libya’s request because, unfortunately, recognition doesn’t require any verification of the quality of the local organizations in charge of SAR operations nor of the existence of safe ports. Since then, it was assumed that everything that happened off the coast of Libya was only Libya’s business, but this is not in accordance with the rules of rescue. International conventions make it clear that if any country, despite being in charge of an SRR, is unable to intervene or doesn’t intervene, the nearest coastal countries have a duty to take over rescue operations. However, Libya only intervenes when it wants. Moreover, it’s the only country that intervenes by pursuing and capturing shipwrecked people, even using weapons. This has created an organizational gap in rescue operations in the Mediterranean despite the fact that international conventions call for total and continuous coverage of emergencies. Add to this the fact that Libya has no safe ports, as many court rulings have established, but there cannot be an SRR without safe ports.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: When this political choice was made, was there also a personnel turnover within the Coast Guard based on officers’ inclination and willingness to adapt to these new policies?

V.A.: I wouldn’t say so because officer turnover in higher command positions happens through a fairly long period of professional activity and assessments. However, we can suppose that the degree of collaborative ›creativity‹ in undermining SAR operations (institutional and private) in the Strait of Sicily in recent years has also had an impact on officer assessments, thus determining what we could call an ›homeopathic‹ alignment with the current political will.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: NGOs have long been complaining about worsening operating conditions at sea. Among other things, since the establishment of the Libyan SRR in 2018, a significant reduction in the number of Navtex messages1 has been reported.

V.A.: I don’t know about the flow of communication between the MRCC in Rome and ships to report potentially dangerous situations. What I do know, however, is that silence tends to prevail in the Strait of Sicily and that ships, whenever possible, ignored those messages. We shouldn’t generalize, but if a merchant ship that has carried out a rescue operation is then held up for days with shipwrecked people on board (as has happened several times), it’s severely penalized, with serious consequences for the ship owner. Nowadays, if they can, merchant ships stay away from the scene, and many survivors (like those from the boat that sank on 17 June 2024 off the coast of Calabria) report having sent calls for help to the many vessels passing by without receiving a response. Silence is one of the most terrible things at sea.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: Another complaint voiced by NGOs is that their ships are not involved, as the MRCC in Rome prefers to turn to others.

V.A.: The presence of NGO ships at sea is due to the fact that those who ought to be intervening are unable or unwilling to do so. All over the world, NGOs try to fill institutional gaps. Thus, NGOs intervened forcefully when the Italian-led military and humanitarian operation Mare Nostrum was terminated and, after the costly involvement of merchant ships in rescue operations, Port Captaincies replaced them with NGO volunteers – without paying them and coordinating them directly. Today, however, the activities of NGOs are hindered in all sorts of ways, following a precise political design in the face of which civilian rescue organizations haven’t been so good at organizing together, for example, with shared leadership, lawyers, and jurists, constantly updated databases, or by sharing all the information about what happens at sea among them.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: In 2015, at an International Maritime Organization conference, the Italian Coast Guard delegation proposed launching an international SAR operation that would go beyond the obligations imposed by international law. How was this idea shelved?

V.A.: The idea didn’t come to fruition because it had become widely accepted—due to pressure by many media outlets—that activities like Operation Mare Nostrum would constitute a ›pull factor‹, that if we left rescue ships in the Sicilian Channel, people would be pushed to leave. This assumption has repeatedly been shown to be unfounded. The real ›pull factor‹ is geographical; to eliminate it, we’d have to move Africa further south or Sicily further north.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: NGOs have been enduring so-called administrative persecution in Italian ports for years. What does it consist of?

V.A.: We have to distinguish between two periods. The first began with the so-called ›Security Decrees‹ (2018–2019). The Coast Guard carried out very harsh interventions against civil rescue vessels. Their legal base was the Paris Memorandum, a convention that aimed to ensure that the safety standards of ships flying a flag other than that of the country where they are located are not lower than the safety standards of ships in the host country. This is because if ships in bad conditions entered our ports, scrupulous ship owners would suffer unfair competition. Thus, the Memorandum provides that periodic inspections of ships must be carried out, especially for those carrying high-risk goods or for those with clear inadequacies—vessels that are poorly maintained, run-down, or visibly derelict—to ascertain their quality. Ships may not be re-inspected in the following six months except in case of clear inadequacies. These checks, which are very reasonable and measured, consist of a general inspection and, if inadequacies emerge, a more thorough one. So, the Paris Memorandum has been used as a weapon against NGO ships, which are subjected to continuous and lengthy inspections, sanctioned and seized because they are put on a par with passenger ships. It’s clear that rescue ships don’t have cabins with bunks and toilets for long stops or long periods at sea. Means of rescue for passenger ships require special spaces and logistics that rescue ships clearly don’t have. The inspectors’ reasoning was if ships carry out methodical rescue operations and take people on board, these people become passengers, so rescue ships must have the same safety standards as passenger ships. Then, if ships transport passengers, we don’t see their rescue operations as SAR operations, and our response to their request for a POS (Place of Safety) to disembark shipwrecked people is a POD (Port of Destination), the same one we assign to commercial ships. In the end, rescue ships are commercial vessels, and the shipwrecked people are passengers like those on a ferry, but they are forced to disembark in the furthest possible places.

The second period came with the so-called ›Piantedosi Decree‹ (2022). The distorted use of the Paris Memorandum had been condemned by the EU Court of Justice. Hence, the Italian government performed additional regulatory engineering, requiring that NGO ships do not perform more than one rescue at a time. Rescue vessels will be assigned to a disembarkation port three or four days away. Their persecutory intent turned into blatant ideological doggedness, and the new provisions allowed for new inspections, this time to verify compliance with the directives issued not only by the MRCC in Rome but also by the Libyan authorities, with the consequent economic sanctions and administrative seizure of the ship. The judiciary has repeatedly ruled that these sanctions are unfounded. So, the series of court decisions delegitimizing the government’s actions goes on.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: In 2018 and 2019, two Coast Guard ships, the Diciotti and the Gregoretti respectively, were denied permission to dock. Then, when permission to dock was granted, they were denied permission to disembark the people they had rescued. So, not only did the government take the shipwrecked people hostage, but they also held the Coast Guard officers who were forced to act as jailers for those who had been rescued. How was this possible?

V.A.: It was definitely a trauma. It’s unthinkable that a state military unit should be forced to remain outside the port. Port Captaincy vessels go out to sea and return to port like we leave and come back to our homes. On that occasion, the expression ›sea taxi‹—coined by a minister against those who had rescued migrants—undermined a long history of self-sacrifice and solidarity at sea, but also the very dignity of the Port Captaincies. Two Coast Guard ships were left out of the port for days with shipwrecked people on board [...]. The wound was deep, and perhaps it left an irreversible mark, overshadowing the spontaneous generosity of that rescue operation.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: Some time ago, talking about the Cutro shipwreck, in which 94 people died off the coast of Calabria on 26 February 2023, you spoke of the banality of evil.

V.A.: The banality of evil is a specter haunting us since the last century. We see it in the actions of civil servants who, in the name of misguided loyalty, disregard ethical values to comply with directives that sometimes are even blatantly illegitimate. At the end of the day, officials feel at peace with their conscience only because they have obeyed. This expression is linked to the terrible scenarios of executives who impeccably organized the departure of convoys toward Nazi extermination camps without caring about what would happen to the people who were being taken there. It was enough for them to have obeyed. All things considered, the banality of evil emerges when the powers that dictate our consciences and knowledge breathe down our necks.

The Ministry of Interior has dictated that the defense of our borders must override rescue operations. These new political guidelines are imposed not only through laws but also homeopathically and mellifluously through ›technical board meetings‹, seemingly marginal measures, and minor directives that are informally addressed to subordinate offices. All of these pieces convey the same message: »Do not move unless it’s really necessary.« Then tragedies like the one in Cutro happen, and everyone wonders: »How could this happen?« Some naively believe that a politician or a high-ranking official picked up the phone and issued the order »Don’t go out to sea«, but the mechanism is far more sophisticated. Responsibility is suspended, decision-making centers are ›adjusted‹, and steps are taken between us and the emergency until it becomes a distant point beyond real geographical distance.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: Is it possible that similar cases are dealt with based on different criteria depending on the circumstances and the MRCC officer in charge? Is there some leeway in the work of the Coast Guard?

V.A.: I think it’s always a matter of general political assessments. Port Captaincies have total discretionary power over matters related to rescue operations, yet they have taken not just one but two steps backward, allowing decisions to be made elsewhere. These days, political assessments prevail over responses to distress calls, and the lives of migrants are worth less than power balances and personal careers.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: So, MRCC officers in Rome make decisions based on consultations with a set of overarching decision-makers linked to the Ministry of Transport, the Ministry of Interior, and so on?

V.A.: Transport? If only! When it comes to rescuing migrants, the Ministry of Transport has been reduced to a mere appendix of the Ministry of Interior. However, when no migrants are involved, there’s no need for authorization by the Ministry of Interior; patrol boats leave immediately, and press releases are issued promptly. Now, the long-lasting and difficult work of patrol boats in the Sicilian Channel has no visibility, and no recognition is given to those who have carried out missions involving great physical and psychological effort. The greatest reward would be the satisfaction of being told »Bravo, you’ve saved people.« In 2011, we based the entire information and promotional campaign of the Port Captaincies on rescue operations in the Sicilian Channel, conveying a strong and healthy identity—»Look, it’s us, the Italian Coast Guard«—and, indeed, we were looked up to from all over the world. Now, all of this is gone.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: The Coast Guard used to publish periodic reports on migration-related SAR activities, stating how many people had been rescued, by whom, and so on. Since 2019, nothing has been published. How come?

V.A.: At some point, communication, related to rescue activities in the Sicilian Channel, was transferred to the Ministry of Interior. Port Captaincies disseminate other institutional information, except in particular cases where communication is carefully filtered to fend off any criticism. This is also part of the silence surrounding this issue.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: So, this was a political decision. The so-called ›disembarkation dashboard‹ replaced your communication, taking it back to the lexicon of security.

V.A.: Security, policing, fear, and so on. The Ministry of Transport and Port Captaincies relinquished control over communication on rescue operations involving migrants, which is their own area of competence, and transferred it to the Ministry of Interior.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: In what other ways is the role of the Coast Guard being reduced?

V.A.: The Coast Guard was stripped of its main institutional role through bureaucratic maneuvers (the so-called ›technical board meetings‹ of the Ministry of Interior) or informal orders to peripheral offices. In this way, the Coast Guard has undoubtedly been pushed aside with regard to rescue operations at sea in the Strait of Sicily, where it had always been working with full autonomy, drawing on the strength of a great deal of experience and professionalism accrued through the years. Mortifying this capital means weakening Italy’s presence in the Mediterranean – so much for border protection! – and diminishing its ability to respond to emergencies because all rescue operations are different, and experience doesn’t come from manuals. It comes from action. The latter is always combined with a broader vision. In 2011, the then General Commander, Admiral Brusco, decided to move a good number of 300-class patrol boats to Lampedusa and the south of Sicily. These unsinkable self-righting units would have been indispensable in Cutro, but they remained in port. Admiral Brusco deployed them in Sicily at the first hints of the Arab Spring, which generated significant arrivals by sea. Mortifying the corps deprives us of a vision and strategy built on our necessary presence at sea.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: Based on the 2023 deal between Italy and Albania, the management of many of the people intercepted at sea will soon be outsourced to ›Italian‹ detention centers in Albania. How is this going to affect the work of the Coast Guard?

V.A.: First of all, the Albania scheme presents problems with regard to international law. Whose territory is it? Who operates there? This proposal appears logistically difficult, if not counterproductive. We’d have to leave one of our ships to patrol international waters, even just one large unit, for example, a ferry. That ship would be gradually filled with people. It’d be a kind of citadel equipped with an infirmary, police services, and everything it needs for long-term stationing and for processing asylum applications to select people for the Albanian camp (presumably, adult males with no right to asylum). After having been sufficiently filled (How long will this take? How much will it cost?), this Italian ship (which as such is Italian territory) will finally reach an Albanian port to let people disembark instead of heading to Italy. These people will move from Italian territory to Albanian territory, where they won’t be able to exercise the rights, they’d enjoy in Italy. From a maritime point of view, this scheme seems incoherent as well as ethically unacceptable, like any imprisonment without fault.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: So, Port Captaincies would be required to transport people who have been rescued directly onto these ships.

V.A.: People certainly cannot be sorted on board patrol boats, due to the lack of space and adequate organization, and patrol boats surely cannot go as far as Albania – they are fast, but they are not hospitable.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: After the Cutro shipwreck, Admiral De Giorgi, the former Chief of Staff of the Italian Navy, said »We would have needed a single maritime center«, like in the days of Operation Mare Nostrum, which the Navy coordinated. What did he mean?

V.A.: Admiral De Giorgi is a very sharp and pragmatic officer. We owe him for the Mare Nostrum mission, for all that it meant, its bright and dark sides. On that occasion, the Navy’s commitment saved many lives and brought a good number of boat drivers to justice. Mare Nostrum was also intended to intercept criminal activities linked to migration. This is why military ships went almost all the way to Libya. I was and remain convinced that boat drivers are not crucial to criminal activities. I believe the real mafia is ashore, doing politics and business, and also with Italy. Operation Mare Nostrum lasted a year, starting after the Lampedusa tragedy of 3 October 2013, in which 366 people died.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: And, eight days later, it was followed by the other deadly shipwreck between Malta and Lampedusa, which saw an Italian ship failing to intervene.

V.A.: Another children’s shipwreck. After the Lampedusa tragedy, doubts were raised (it was not a delegitimization, that was more recently) on the Port Captaincies’ capacity to respond to emergencies in the Mediterranean. A few days later, Operation Mare Nostrum was launched. With Navy ships that went almost as far as the African shore, the pattern of departures also changed. Libyan criminals, like our own mafia, are quick to adapt their shady business. Operation Mare Nostrum also turned out to be very expensive, which prompted the then opposition parties—Lega and Fratelli d’Italia—to call for its dismantlement. In fact, it was terminated at the end of 2014, when the General Command started to rely on merchant ships for rescue operations methodically. To return to Admiral De Giorgi’s proposal for shared international action, I believe we do need a mission of that kind, as long as the coordination of rescue operations remains in the hands of the Coast Guard. Not only because this is what’s established by the Hamburg Convention but also because Port Captaincies have a great deal of experience in rescue operations and because of the relations that Maritime Offices have with ports, with the diverse fabric of maritime society, and with communities by the sea.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: During Operation Mare Nostrum, what was the Coast Guard coordinating, if all migration-related rescue operations were coordinated by the Navy?

V.A.: Port Captaincies carried out rescue operations in the areas closer to the Italian coast, on the boats that had not been intercepted earlier. Their patrol boats were at the Navy ships’ disposal in case transshipments were needed to bring migrants ashore. The Coast Guard felt a certain sense of subalternity. However, their patrol boats could have never gone as close to Libya as the navy ships did. While I have no doubts regarding the quality of the commitment shown during Operation Mare Nostrum, I remain somewhat perplexed about the strategy.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: Let’s go back to the Libyan SRR. Formally, it exists because it was declared. So, is there anything to object to?

V.A.: I’d have a lot to object to because, if from a formal point of view, the recognition of a Libyan SRR makes perfect sense, the reality is that it doesn’t make sense, crucially in relation to rescue operations. It cannot be enough for a country to state: »That stretch of sea is in front of my house, and I’m going to take care of it.« It must also guarantee the adequate organization of safe ports, all of which are elements that Libya doesn’t have. Italy has improperly supported the activities of the so-called Libyan MRCC through the constant presence of an Italian Navy ship in Libya, and often, telephone calls to the Libyan operations center are not answered. The operator only speaks Arabic, and it’s unclear where their MRCC is located. In Libya, there are two governments at war with each other and at least two so-called ›Coast Guards‹. There are prison camps for migrants and the horrors which the UN and the Pope have talked about. Libya is the only SRR in the world where people are brought back to the shore because they’ve been captured, not because they’ve been rescued.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: Months ago, in relation to the case of the Asso Ventotto ship, the Corte di Cassazione (the highest court in the Italian judicial system) ruled that the push-backs to Libya, which were carried out by Italian commercial ships and coordinated by the Libyan Coast Guard were illegitimate. Since then, one would expect that Italian ships would be ignoring the orders of the Libyan Coast Guard. But nothing is going to change in the practices of the MRCC in Rome ...

V.A.: ...and of Frontex! The Cassazione, in the case of Carola Rackete, also reiterated that shipwrecked people should not be returned to Libya. If this is the jurisprudential framework, everyone ought to obey and prevent push-backs to Libya.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: Is it possible to exercise the right to disobedience in a military corps? How does conflict take place within a corps that feels stripped of its mission?

V.A.: In a military corps, there can be no right to disobey except for the duty to disobey a clearly illegitimate order. It’s an action that one pays for in person, completely alone, and with the certainty that there will be misunderstandings. Sometimes, one wonders whether it’s better to take off one’s cap and leave, or whether it’s one’s duty to stay and manage the debacle. The price to pay is definitely high – loneliness and marginalization in an environment that has pervaded your life. Similarly, one pays for any behavior that’s not in line with the orders given by superiors.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: Are you also referring to your personal history?

V.A.: I’ve always been able to do what I thought was right, respecting the law and the values I believe in. I believe that one of my choices was difficult for my superiors, but I took responsibility for it and accepted the consequences. In 2011, I decided to take some journalists on board patrol boats in the Sicilian Channel (today it would be inconceivable) to allow the sea, the faces of shipwrecked people, and our own lives to reach the homes of Italian families. Journalists are almost always greeted by sailors in starched uniforms. So, television audiences and newspaper readers were also shown the ›tired‹ uniforms worn by the young men who go out to sea, return after saving lives, and come back a few hours later to save more lives, who certainly have no time to iron their trousers. Thus, their mothers, wives, and children saw their sailors rescuing people at sea. They had seen ›targets‹ (that’s what they call the little dots in the sea intercepted by their radars) which, when they were finally reached, became eyes wide open with fear, bodies, women, children ... I took and gave others this chance, and I was happy that this brought so much honor and – if I may say so – so much love to the Port Captaincies. A great many young men then requested to join the corps, and a great many sailors applied to be assigned to Lampedusa. The silence we were talking about is not only that of communication breakdowns. It also comes from not wanting to or not knowing how to tell our own story anymore.

P.C. & L.Q.P.: They also required us researchers to ask the General Command for permission to interview Coast Guard officials.

V.A.: This also happens to all journalists, and permission is almost never granted. On 17 June 2024, there was another shipwreck that caused the death of 67 people, including 22 children. Entire days were spent meticulously searching the Italian SRR using aircraft and patrol boats. All we read were a few short communiqués, no tributes to the dead or the crews working at sea. The bodies were sorted in various ports, almost in secret, without respect for the right to report. We have almost forgotten about that shipwreck, also because it happened far away, about 100 miles off the coast of Calabria. If the bodies had washed up on the beach, as they did in Cutro, we might have remembered. And this is one of the things that the sea condemns us to – what happens beyond the horizon seems to be due to fate alone, but it is not so.