Eighteen months after a refugee boat sank in the Mediterranean, believed to have killed more than 100 people, Italy has filed charges against six officials.
Members of the coast guard and financial police are to face charges for failing to provide assistance, judicial authorities said Tuesday.
A smuggler from Turkey has already been sentenced to 20 years in prison for the disaster. Three other suspected smugglers are also due to stand trial.
The boat left Turkey in February last year, with more than 150 people on board, in an attempt to transport migrants across the Mediterranean to southern Italy.
According to survivors’ reports, the heavily overloaded ship capsized during an abrupt maneuver when it was already in sight of the coast. At least 94 people died, including many children. People are still missing.
Four of the accused officials work for the Italian financial police and two for the coast guard.
The Public Prosecutor’s Office has placed the blame mainly on the financial police, claiming that they abandoned the search for the sunken ship after the first reports without even informing the coast guard, the Italian newspaper La Repubblica reported. The coast guard later falsified the logbooks.
Italy’s right-wing government, led by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, has drastically increased the penalties for smugglers and their accomplices in the wake of the tragedy, now facing prison sentences of up to 30 years.
There are still casualties during the perilous journey of refugee boats across the Mediterranean Sea to Europe.
