Senior UN official calls for robust search-and-rescue efforts in Mediterranean

The UN high commissioner for refugees, Antonio Guterres, on Thursday called on the European Union (EU) to make robust search and rescue efforts in the Mediterranean following the deaths of at least 300 people trying to reach Europe from Libya earlier this week.

"There can be no doubt that Europe's Operation Triton is a woefully inadequate replacement for Italy's Mare Nostrum," UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric quoted Guterres as saying.

"Mr. Guterres emphasized that the focus has to be about saving lives," Dujarric said at a daily news briefing here. "He called on the European Union to urgently set up a search-and-rescue operation similar in scale and reach to Mare Nostrum."

If not, he warned, it is inevitable that many more people will die trying to reach safety in Europe.

The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) has repeatedly urged European governments to address the needs of people fleeing conflict and trying to reach Europe, with the aim of reducing loss of life at sea, the spokesman noted.

"It also encouraged a greater focus on addressing the root causes of population movements, such as political solutions to conflict and the provision of safe and legal alternatives to dangerous boat journeys," he added.

Earlier this week, Francois Crepeau, UN special rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, said asylum-seekers and migrants will continue to arrive and stay in Europe "no matter what" and " migrants will continue arriving despite all efforts to stop them, at a terrible cost in lives and suffering if nothing else is put in place."

Last year, the number of people risking their lives to cross the Mediterranean on smugglers' boats rose dramatically and many of them were fleeing conflicts or persecution in Syria, the Horn of Africa and other parts of sub-Saharan Africa, according to UNHCR.

In all, at least 218,000 people crossed the Mediterranean and 3, 500 lives were lost.

Italy, following heavy loss of life in two incidents on the high seas in October 2013, launched the Mare Nostrum operation -- rescuing tens of thousands of people. UNHCR has repeatedly expressed concern about the ending of Mare Nostrum late last year without a similar European search-and-rescue operation to replace it.

Last November, the EU border agency Frontex launched Operation Triton, which focuses on border surveillance but can contribute to rescue efforts. Enditem