Right-wing conservative media were leaked a Frontex video showing a Sea-Watch crew rescuing 90 migrants, as five masked men on board the small boat sped off back to Libya. The images are now being used to stir up sentiment against sea rescuers.

In August 2017, Italian authorities impounded the civilian rescue ship “Iuventa”, operated by the Berlin-based association “Jugend Rettet”, in Lampedusa. Relying on bugs planted on the bridge, intercepted phone calls and informants, the Public Prosecutor’s Office accused the crew of aiding illegal immigration: they were alleged to have coordinated with Libyan smugglers and, after a rescue, to have handed a boat of refugees over to them. Seven years later, a court acquitted the defendants on all counts and found that they had fulfilled their duty to rescue people in distress at sea.

Conservative and right-wing media are now following the same script to mount a campaign against the rescue ship “Sea-Watch 5”, operated by the German non-governmental organisation of the same name: last Thursday, the French daily “Le Figaro” and the Italian newspaper “Il Giornale” published a video filmed by a surveillance aircraft belonging to the EU border agency Frontex. The footage, dated 11 May, shows two orange rescue boats from the “Sea-Watch 5” making five shuttle trips to take 90 migrants on board from a double-decker boat fitted with two powerful outboard motors. Also on board were five masked men dressed in paramilitary-style clothing.

Beforehand, the “Sea-Watch 5” crew had handed out life jackets to the people on the boat. The video also shows that, towards the end of the operation, two of the masked men make gestures of approval towards the rescue dinghies. The men then head back towards Libya at high speed, throwing objects into the sea.

Sea-Watch disputes interpretation

Sea-Watch confirms that the video was filmed on 11 May. That morning, the crew had taken 72 adults and 18 suspected minors from Bangladesh on board. However, the NGO disputes the interpretation put forward by “Le Figaro” and “Il Giornale”: the aid workers neither cooperated with Libyan smugglers nor waved at the uniformed men. The crew of the “Sea-Watch 5” spotted the apparently distressed boat on the horizon in the early morning and sent rescue teams there “to assess the situation”.

From a distance, the crew initially did not realise that suspected smugglers were on board. Two of the boat’s occupants were unconscious, several severely weakened, and people were locked below deck. Nor was there any rescue or navigation equipment visible. “All of this clearly confirmed for us that this was a case requiring rescue at sea”, the NGO told “nd”.

Italian judiciary investigates captain

What the edited Frontex video no longer shows: shortly after the successful rescue operation, a vessel belonging to the so-called Libyan coastguard approached at high speed and opened fire on the “Sea-Watch 5” without warning — first with a single shot, then with a full salvo. Over the radio, the armed men threatened to force the German-flagged ship, with the rescued people on board, to sail to Libya. The “Sea-Watch 5” set course northwards, and the Libyan pursuers eventually fell back.

As instructed by the Italian Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre, the Sea-Watch crew headed for Brindisi after a further rescue operation involving a total of 166 migrants. It is possible that the Italian authorities had, in the meantime, been in contact with the armed men from Libya or with Frontex: on entering port on 15 May, the “Sea-Watch 5” was searched by the coastguard and police, navigation data was copied, logbooks were seized, and two crew members were taken away for questioning.

The Public Prosecutor’s Office is now investigating the Dutch captain, Anne van Dam, on suspicion of aiding unauthorised entry. The sentencing range for this offence is known from the “Iuventa” case and can be as much as 20 years’ imprisonment.

Video from investigation files

The published Frontex footage apparently comes from the investigation files of the Public Prosecutor’s Office in Brindisi. “Il Giornale” claims to have learned, from sources close to those files, that the refugee boat had waited for a time in the Libyan search-and-rescue zone. According to the newspaper’s speculation, the boat is said to have set off, with a Starlink satellite unit on board, from the region around Sabratha, west of Tripoli.

In the meantime, the case from 11 May is also doing the rounds in right-wing online media in Germany and Austria. “Tichys Einblick”, “Express” and now also “Bild” see this as confirming the narrative already circulated against “Jugend Rettet”, according to which individual civilian sea rescue organisations cooperate with smuggling networks. “Le Figaro” claims to substantiate this with further footage, said to have been posted on Facebook on 12 May by those rescued from the same refugee boat: a mobile phone video allegedly shows the boat, steered by a masked man, heading towards the “Sea-Watch 5”.

“Our task is to de-escalate”

What this interpretation leaves out: even Frontex itself had already suspected that smugglers in Libya cooperate with local coastguard militias. And that the position data of ships such as the “Sea-Watch 5” can be viewed on tracking websites, meaning boats carrying refugees can set course towards them of their own accord.

International conventions oblige captains to render assistance when people nearby are in distress at sea. According to the criteria of the International Maritime Organization, such a situation already exists if a boat is overloaded or lacks adequate navigation equipment. These criteria apply even if a boat is in fact being steered by smugglers.

From the “Sea-Watch 5″‘s point of view, the masked men represented an additional danger. “Cases have been documented in the past in which such actors have forced people into the water at gunpoint. In such a situation, our task is to de-escalate, avoid further dangers and save human lives”, a statement from the NGO reads. Ships belonging to Sea-Watch and other civilian rescue organisations have repeatedly been threatened or fired upon by armed men from Libya. In Germany, the Federal Police is investigating at least three such cases.

Who leaked the Frontex video?

Sea-Watch says it informed the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre in Italy “fully and transparently” about the events on the morning of 11 May. This is confirmed by two emails seen by “nd”. According to these, the NGO found an unseaworthy black fibreglass boat at 7.49am, described as “double-decked, overcrowded, water in the boat, people asking for help”.

The “Sea-Watch 5” also informed the responsible Italian authorities that “five masked individuals refused to be rescued” and left the scene heading south.

It remains unclear who leaked the Frontex video to the right-wing conservative media: it could have come from Italian judicial circles or from the EU border agency itself. That far-right individuals also work at Frontex has been known at the latest since the tenure of former director Fabrice Leggeri: following his departure, forced by critical media reporting, he successfully ran for the French National Assembly for the Rassemblement National.

Netflix releases “Iuventa” film on the same day

Following the leak to “Le Figaro”, Leggeri and party leader Jordan Bardella, among others, demanded that organisations such as Sea-Watch be treated as supporters of human trafficking. On the messaging platform X, Leggeri stated on Thursday that he had held this position while serving as Frontex director too — and had been criticised for it.

Sea-Watch views the reports as a “defamation campaign by the far right”. This suspicion is reinforced by the timing of the publication last Thursday: the very next day, the film “23,000 Lives”, based on the story of the ship “Iuventa”, was released on Netflix. The drama is a plea in favour of rescuing refugees on their way to Europe — and against letting them be dragged back to torture camps by armed Libyan pursuers.

This is also confirmed by Anna Giannessi, Italian spokesperson for Sea-Watch, the oldest organisation in the civilian rescue fleet in the Mediterranean: “This smear campaign against civil society will not intimidate us. We remain determined to save lives and to fight for freedom of movement.” This also includes breaking the well-documented cycle of interception, detention, mistreatment and repeated exploitation of people fleeing their home countries — “a system that is funded and maintained with European money”.

Published in German in „nd“.

Image: Before the Sea-Watch crew took the 90 people from the overcrowded speedboat on board, they handed out life jackets. Two people were said to be unconscious, others locked below deck (screenshot).