"We can talk as much as we want about human rights and the importance of complying with international obligations, but if at the same time we just leave people to die – perhaps because we don't know their identity or because they come from Africa – it exposes how meaningless those words are," said Strik, a Dutch member of the council's committee on migration, refugees and displaced persons, and the special rapporteur charged with investigating the case.
The incident has become well known due to the harrowing accounts of the survivors, but the report makes clear that many similar "silent tragedies" have occurred in recent years. Last year a record number of migrant deaths were recorded in the Mediterranean. "When you think about the media attention focused on the [Costa] Concordia and then compare it to the more than 1,500 migrant lives lost in the Mediterranean in 2011, the difference is striking," Strik said.
The Guardian: Migrants left to die after catalogue of failures, says report into boat tragedy, March 28, 2012
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