The 'Ocean Viking' arrives at the French port of Toulon with more than 200 migrants on board

MADRID, 11 Nov. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The 'Ocean Viking' ship arrived this Friday with more than 200 migrants and refugees on board at the French port of Toulon, near the city of Marseille, after Paris offered the possibility of docking due to the silence of the Italian authorities, reluctant to authorize the arrival of migrants after the recent change of government.

The 'Ocean Viking' has arrived at the port around 8:30 am and the disembarkation has begun about 20 minutes later, according to the French television channel BMFTV. Among the 230 migrants on board are about 60 children.

The local prefect, Evence Richard, has indicated that the authorities "have mobilized more than 600 people" to "organize" the landing. France stated that the authorization was given under the premise that it will only take care of part of these people, who will be distributed among different European countries.

In this sense, the French Secretary of State for European Affairs, Laurence Boone, has criticized the Italian Government for its position in the case and has denounced that "it has not respected the European mechanism with which it is committed".

"There is a breach of trust, since a unilateral decision has been registered that endangers the lives (of the migrants on board the ship) and that is not in line with International Law," Boone explained in an interview granted. this very Friday to France Info.

The French Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, expressed himself in this line on Thursday, describing the position of Giorgia Meloni's Executive as "unacceptable", before anticipating that France will expel "without delay" all those who do not have the right to territory or asylum and will take care of a third of those who can stay

In response to the change in policies in Italy, the French government has also decided to stop applying a European agreement that leads it to welcome 3,500 migrants arriving in Italian territory in one year, according to Franceinfo, within a political pulse between Rome and Paris that It's been days in the making.

The NGO SOS Mediterranée, to which the ship belongs, said on Thursday that it received the news from the port "with a mixture of relief and anger", since it considers that the controversy of recent days shows the "political manipulation" of the operations. rescue.

Thus, he called "urgently" for the EU to establish a "predictable" mechanism to disembark migrants. More than 1,300 migrants and refugees have perished in central Mediterranean waters so far this year, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).