19/09:300 people from Lebanon rescued by a merchant vessel and pushed back to Turkey

20.09.2022 / 11:10 / Eastern Med

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 19 of September 2022
Case name: 2022_09_19 - AEG / Eastern Med - 1011
Situation: About 300 people who had left from Lebanon were stuck at sea between Cyprus and Crete, rescued by a merchant vessel and pushed back to Turkey
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Eastern Med

Summary of the Case:
At 6:30 pm on September 19, the Alarm Phone was contacted by a boat in distress with 300 people, among them women and many children. They had left from Lebanon two days before. They were stuck at sea between Cyprus and Crete, with a broken engine and with no food nor water. We alerted the authorities in Cyprus and Greece at 8 pm and then lost contact with the boat. Calling them later in the night, JRCC Larnaca told us that a rescue operation was ongoing. The next morning, they confirmed that they had rescued all the people of this boat as well as another one (AP915). Yet, we learned from a contact on Cyprus that the people were in fact rescued by a merchant vessel, that was given the order to continue to its next destination, Istanbul, Turkey. The UNHCR agency there confirmed the arrival and registration of 283 people, Syrian and Lebanese.

Credibility:

Border police patrols
While the exact location of patrols is of course constantly changing, this line indicates the approximate boundary routinely patrolled by border guards’ naval assets. In the open sea, it usually correspond to the outer extent of the contiguous zone, the area in which “State may exercise the control necessary to prevent infringement of its customs, fiscal, immigration or sanitary laws” (UNCLOS, art. 33). Data source: interviews with border police officials.
Coastal radars
Approximate radar beam range covered by coastal radars operating in the frame of national marine traffic monitoring systems. The actual beam depends from several different parameters (including the type of object to be detected). Data source: Finmeccanica.
Exclusive Economic Zone
Maritime area beyond and adjacent to the territorial sea in which the coastal state exercises sovereign rights for the purposes of exploring and exploiting, conserving and managing the natural resources, whether living or non-living, the seabed and its subsoil and the superjacent waters. Its breadth is 200 nautical miles from the straight baselines from which the territorial sea is measured (UNCLOS, Arts. 55, 56 and 57). Data source: Juan Luis Suárez de Vivero, Atlas of the European Seas and Oceans
Frontex operations
Frontex has, in the past few years, carried out several sea operations at the maritime borders of the EU. The blue shapes indicate the approximate extend of these operations. Data source: Migreurop Altas.
Mobile phone coverage
Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) network coverage. Data source: Collins Mobile Coverage.
Oil and gas platforms
Oil and gas platforms in the Mediterranean. Data source:
Search and Rescue Zone
An area of defined dimensions within which a given state is has the responsibility to co-ordinate Search and Rescue operations, i.e. the search for, and provision of aid to, persons, ships or other craft which are, or are feared to be, in distress or imminent danger. Data source: IMO availability of search and rescue (SAR) services - SAR.8/Circ.3, 17 June 2011.
Territorial Waters
A belt of sea (usually extending up to 12 nautical miles) upon which the sovereignty of a coastal State extends (UNCLOS, Art. 2). Data source: Juan Luis Suárez de Vivero, Atlas of the European Seas and Oceans