OBservatory of MOBility

Tracking mobility and displacement across the Central Mediterranean Route

International actors

The International Criminal Police Organization – INTERPOL
An international organization that facilitates worldwide police cooperation and crime control. It is the world's largest international police organization. It is headquartered in Lyon, France, with seven regional bureaus worldwide, and a National Central Bureau in all 196 member states

International Maritime Organization – IMO
The International Maritime Organization is the United Nations specialized agency with responsibility for the safety and security of shipping and the prevention of marine and atmospheric pollution by ships. IMO's work supports the UN SDGs.​

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime
The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime is a United Nations office that was established in 1997 as the Office for Drug Control and Crime Prevention by combining the United Nations International Drug Control Program (UNDCP) and the Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice Division in the United Nations Office at Vienna, adopting the current name in 2002. 

Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS)
The Economic Community of West African States (also known as CEDEAO in French and Portuguese) is a regional political and economic union of fifteen countries located in West Africa. The union was established on 28 May 1975, with the signing of the Treaty of Lagos, with its stated mission to promote economic integration across the region. A revised version of the treaty was agreed and signed on 24 July 1993 in Cotonou, the largest city in Benin. Headquarters: Federal Capital Territory, Nigeria

African Union
The African Union (AU) is a continental body consisting of the 55 member states that make up the countries of the African Continent. It was officially launched in 2002 as a successor to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU, 1963-1999). The bloc was founded on 26 May 2001 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and launched on 9 July 2002 in Durban, South Africa. Headquarters: Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

European Institutions and Agencies

European Commission
The European Commission is the EU's politically independent executive arm. It is alone responsible for drawing up proposals for new European legislation, and it implements the decisions of the European Parliament and the Council of the EU.

The European Union Naval Force Mediterranean Operation Irini.
Operation EUNAVFOR MED IRINI has the core task of implementation of the UN arms embargo through the use of aerial, satellite and maritime assets.

European Migrant Smuggling Centre - EMSC
The EMSC was established in early 2016 following a period of highly dynamic irregular migration, with vulnerable migrants travelling largely unrestricted in sizeable groups across the Mediterranean Sea, external land borders and further on, into Europe towards their desired destination countries. 

FRONTEX the European Border and Coast Guard Agency
Frontex was established in 2004 as the European Agency for the Management of Operational Cooperation at External Borders and is primarily responsible for coordinating border control efforts. It is currently headquartered in Warsaw, Poland. In coordination with the border and coast guards of member states, it exercises border control of the European Schengen Area, a task within the area of freedom, security and justice domain

National Authorities

Italy

Italian Coast Guard (Italian Navy; Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport)

Italian Navy (Marina Militare, Ministry of Defence)

Italian Customs Police (Guardia di Finanza; Ministry of Economy and Finance)

Italian Military Police (Arma dei Carabinieri; Ministry of Defence)

Italian National Police (Polizia di Stato; Ministry of Interior)

Malta

Armed Forces of Malta

Custom Authorities (Ministry of Finance)

Malta Police Forces (Ministry of home affairs and national security)

Libya

Libyan Navy

Libyan Coast Guard


Figures on human mobility by international organizations, agencies, and law enforcement databases


IOM Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM)
The Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM) gathers and analyzes data to disseminate critical multi-layered information on the mobility, vulnerabilities, and needs of displaced and mobile populations that enables decision-makers and responders to provide these populations with better context-specific assistance.
https://dtm.iom.int/

IOM Global Migration Data Analysis Centre (GMDAC)
Established in September 2015, the International Organization for Migration’s Global Migration Data Analysis Centre was set up to respond to calls for better international migration data and analysis.
https://gmdac.iom.int/
The Global Migration Data Portal: https://www.migrationdataportal.org/

UNHCR Operation Data Portal, Mediterranean Situation
The Operational Data Portal (ODP) was created in 2011 to enable UNHCR’s institutional responsibility to provide an information and data-sharing platform to facilitate coordination of refugee emergencies. This was achieved using independent ‘situation views’ covering major emergencies such as the Syria situation or the Central African Republic emergency, among others.
Datasets licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License.
https://data.unhcr.org/en/situations/mediterranean

FRONTEX the European Border and Coast Guard Agency
• Monitoring and risk analysis - Migratory map
Maps presenting the migratory situation in Europe. Each circle represents one of the main migratory routes into the EU: https://www.frontex.europa.eu/what-we-do/monitoring-and-risk-analysis/migratory-map/
• Public Register of Documents
With risk analysis, strategic risk analysis, by Frontex and by the Agency with partners in Africa, Eastern Europe and the Balkans
https://shorturl.at/sO049

National institutions and official data on migration and disembarkation

Italy

Ministry of Interior: regular updates on disembarkations.

Geneva Conventions of 1949 and amending protocols
Source: The International Committee of the Red Cross.
The Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols are international treaties that contain the most important rules limiting the barbarity of war. They protect people who do not take part in the fighting (civilians, medics, aid workers) and those who can no longer fight (wounded, sick and shipwrecked troops, prisoners of war).

The 1949 Geneva Conventions
The first Geneva Convention protects wounded and sick soldiers on land during war.
The second Geneva Convention protects wounded, sick and shipwrecked military personnel at sea during war.
The third Geneva Convention applies to prisoners of war.
The fourth Geneva Convention affords protection to civilians, including in occupied territory. 

The 1949 conventions have been modified with three amendment protocols:
• Protocol I (1977) relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts
• Protocol II (1977) relating to the Protection of Victims of Non-International Armed Conflicts
• Protocol III (2005) relating to the Adoption of an Additional Distinctive Emblem

International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS), 1974
Adoption: 1 November 1974; Entry into force: 25 May 1980
The SOLAS Convention in its successive forms is generally regarded as the most important of all international treaties concerning the safety of merchant ships. The first version was adopted in 1914, in response to the Titanic disaster, the second in 1929, the third in 1948, and the fourth in 1960. The 1974 version includes the tacit acceptance procedure - which provides that an amendment shall enter into force on a specified date unless, before that date, objections to the amendment are received from an agreed number of Parties.

International Convention on Maritime Search and Rescue (SAR)
Adoption: 27 April 1979; Entry into force: 22 June 1985
The 1979 Convention, adopted at a Conference in Hamburg, was aimed at developing an international SAR plan, so that, no matter where an accident occurs, the rescue of persons in distress at sea will be coordinated by a SAR organization and, when necessary, by co-operation between neighbouring SAR organizations.

United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea
The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea was adopted in 1982. It lays down a comprehensive regime of law and order in the world's oceans and seas establishing rules governing all uses of the oceans and their resources. It embodies in one instrument traditional rules for the uses of the oceans and at the same time introduces new legal concepts and regimes and addresses new concerns. The Convention also provides the framework for further development of specific areas of the law of the sea.

Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons Especially Women and Children, supplementing the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (Palermo Protocol)
Adopted 15 November 2000

European Court of Human Rights ECHR 

Regulation (EU) 2016/399 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 9 March 2016 on a Union Code on the rules governing the movement of persons across borders (Schengen Borders Code)

Regulation (EU) No 603/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 June 2013 on the establishment of 'Eurodac' for the comparison of fingerprints for the effective application of Regulation (EU) No 604/2013 establishing the criteria and mechanisms for determining the Member State responsible for examining an application for international protection lodged in one of the Member States by a third-country national or a stateless person and on requests for the comparison with Eurodac data by Member States' law enforcement authorities and Europol for law enforcement purposes, and amending Regulation (EU) No 1077/2011 establishing a European Agency for the operational management of large-scale IT systems in the area of freedom, security and justice (recast) (EURODAC Regulation)

Directive 2008/115/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 December 2008 on common standards and procedures in Member States for returning illegally staying third-country nationals (Return directive)

Council Directive 2001/55/EC of 20 July 2001 on minimum standards for giving temporary protection in the event of a mass influx of displaced persons and on measures promoting a balance of efforts between Member States in receiving such persons and bearing the consequences thereof (Temporary Protection Directive)

Council Implementing Decision (EU) 2022/382 of 4 March 2022 establishing the existence of a mass influx of displaced persons from Ukraine within the meaning of Article 5 of Directive 2001/55/EC, and having the effect of introducing temporary protection
On 4 March 2022, the Council unanimously adopted the Decision giving those fleeing war in Ukraine the right to temporary protection.

Regulation (EU) 2019/1896 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 13 November 2019 on the European Border and Coast Guard and repealing Regulations (EU) No 1052/2013 and (EU) 2016/1624 (Frontex Regulation)

New Pact on Migration and Asylum (2020)
Documents adopted by the EU Commission (proposals), on 23 September 2020.
The ten texts adopted by the European Parliament, plenary session, LIBE Committee, with amendments (Ordinary Legislative Procedure: first reading), on 10 April 2024. Press release here.
The Council of the European Union adopted the ten legislative texts on 14 May 2024. Press release here.


Bilateral agreements and Memoranda of understanding (MoU)

Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation in the fields of development, the fight against illegal immigration, human trafficking and fuel smuggling and on reinforcing the security of borders between the State of Libya and the Italian Republic.
Signed on 2 February 2017

Memorandum of Understanding between the Government of National Accord of the State of Libya and the Government of the Republic of Malta in the field of combating illegal immigration.
Drawn up and signed in Tripoli on May 28th, 2020

Shipping industry

Confitarma | Confederazione Italiana Armatori
CONFITARMA, the Italian Confederation of Shipowners, was founded in 1901 and is the main association representing the interests of the Italian shipping industry. 

Baltic and International Maritime Council (BIMCO)
The Baltic and International Maritime Council (BIMCO) is one of the largest of international shipping associations representing shipowners. BIMCO's headquarters is in Bagsværd, a suburb of Copenhagen, Denmark

Maersk | Integrated Container Logistics & Supply Chain Services
A Danish shipping and logistics company founded in 1904 by Arnold Peter Møller and his father Peter Mærsk Møller. Maersk's business activities include shipping, port operation, supply chain management and warehousing.

Grassroots initiatives: Mapping and countermapping actions, monitoring and research on deaths at sea along the Central Mediterranean Route


Forensic Architecture
Countermapping. Forensic Architecture (FA) is a research agency based at Goldsmiths, University of London. Our mandate is to develop, employ, and disseminate new techniques, methods, and concepts for investigating state and corporate violence. Our team includes architects, software developers, filmmakers, investigative journalists, scientists, and lawyers. We are an interdisciplinary agency operating across human rights, journalism, architecture, art and aesthetics, academia and the law; in 2022, the Peabody Awards programme wrote that we had co-created ‘an entire new academic field and emergent media practice’.
Since 2020, FA has supported the growth of agencies worldwide that practice and apply our methods. The Investigative Commons is both a global network of practitioners, and a physical space in Berlin, within the offices of our sister agency Forensis.
https://forensic-architecture.org/

Border Forensics
Countermapping. Border Forensics conducts investigations into practices of border violence perpetrated by states, police forces, militaries, and corporations.
https://www.borderforensics.org/

Border Violence Monitoring Network
Working to end violence against people on the move. Testimonies of Pushback; Violence at European Borders
https://borderviolence.eu/

Migration-Control.Info Project
The Migration-Control.Info Project is a transnational network of activists, journalists, translators, academics, and anti-racist organisations from Europe and Africa. We document the externalization of European migration control to third countries, especially in Africa. We work decentralized, self-organized, and non-hierarchical.
https://migration-control.info/en/

The Human Costs of Border Control (HCBC): Deaths at the Borders Database, VU University Amsterdam
On the basis of globalization theories, as well as on the basis of developments in European migration policies, we hypothesize that since 1990 migration law has witnessed a shift from migration control (reactive, focus on concrete individuals) to migration management (pro-active, focus on potential migrant populations). A second hypothesis is that the increased number of ‘irregular’ migrants dying on their way to Europe is an unintended side-effect of this shift. Thirdly, we propose that as a consequence of the shift to border management, the human rights protection previously available regarding migrant fatalities under border control, has become considerably less effective.
The Deaths at the Borders Database is an ‘evidence-base’ derived from official sources generated by the death management systems of Spain, Gibraltar, Italy, Malta and Greece. It aims to fill some of the gaps, and serve as a new, complementary resource to enable further analysis and research, and ultimately to move the discussions about border deaths forward towards concrete recommendations and policy changes. Link to Database; Methodology; Analysis.

Mem.Med Memoria Mediterranea – Mediterranean Memory ETS 
The project works to support families and communities in the search and identification of missing or deceased migrants in the Mediterranean Sea through legal and psychosocial support
https://memoriamediterranea.org/

ALARMPHONE
Hotline for boat people in distress. No rescue, but Alarm.
If you know about an emergency case of people in distress in the Mediterranean Sea, please call our emergency number 0033486517161
https://alarmphone.org/it/contatto/
Watch the Med: Maps, reports and information on the Mediterranean route
Watch the Mediterranean Sea is an online mapping platform to monitor the deaths and violations of migrants' rights at the maritime borders of the EU.
https://watchthemed.net/

Alarmphone Sahara
Alarme Phone Sahara (APS) is a cooperation project between associations, groups and individuals in the Sahel-Saharan region and Europe. The members of the Alarme Phone Sahara network are based in Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Togo, Morocco, Germany and Austria. Alarme Phone Sahara's office is located in Agadez, Niger, which is a crossroads of migration in the Sahelo-Saharan zone. There is also a network of whistleblowers in the region that works in collaboration with the Agadez office.
https://alarmephonesahara.info/en/

Caminando Fronteras
Trabajamos de forma colectiva con personas migrantes, sus familias y defensoras.vcaminando por los derechos humanos en territorios de frontera. combatiendo la impunidad, la violencia y la guerra en las fronteras.
https://caminandofronteras.org/

Migreurop
Migreurop is a network of 51 associations and 40 individual members in 17 countries in Europe, Africa and the Middle East. One of the network’s distinctive features is that it brings together a wide range of grassroots associations, researchers and activists, who pool their knowledge and skills, to collectively document, decipher and denounce the consequences of European migration policies. Thanks to this common analysis, Migreurop fosters synergies and joint mobilisation strategies in favor of the rights of people on the move.
https://migreurop.org/rubrique465.html?lang_nav=fr

Josi and Loni project by Sarita libre (Ita)
https://saritalibre.it/jlproject-mediterranea/

UNITED Against Refugee Deaths
UNITED monitors since 1992 the deaths of refugees and migrants due to the policies of Fortress Europe. Follow for updates, and browse our archive posts for past cases
https://www.facebook.com/UNITEDAgainstRefugeeDeaths/

The Migrants' Files
The human and financial cost of 15 years of Fortress Europe
The Migrants Files was a consortium of journalists from over 15 European countries. It was coordinated by Journalist++.
https://www.themigrantsfiles.com/

Marine Traffic
24/7 AIS ship monitoring, based on AIS receivers. Data shared across oceans, coasts and space. No military ship monitoring.
https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/centerx:17.2/centery:36.7/zoom:7

Vessel Finder
AIS ship monitoring. Very limited monitoring on military ships.
https://www.vesselfinder.com/it

The Civil Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (CMRCC)
The Civil Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (CMRCC) is a coordination and documentation platform for people in distress in the Central Mediterranean Sea. It aims to contribute to creating a network of solidarity in support of people on the move. It supports the fleet of NGOs that have assisted and brought to safety tens of thousands of people since 2014. This was done through maritime rescues carried out by NGO ships, aerial monitoring flights with civil aircraft, and the Alarm Phone hotline.
https://civilmrcc.eu/

Fortress Europe
Gabriele Del Grande's blog. Mapping stories of lives along the Central Mediterranean Route. Closed in 2016.
https://fortresseurope.blogspot.com/

Research and academic networks

HGRA Enhancing Management and Studies on Migration Issues in Libya
EU Co-funded project Grant ERASMUS-EDU-2022-CBHE-STRAND-2. The overall objective of the HGRA project is to improve the capabilities of Libya to manage and mitigate the impact of the Libyan migration crisis both as a destination country and as a country of origin, by strengthening the Higher Education Institutions system.
Leading institution: UNIMED Italy; partners: Sapienza University of Rome, University of Barcelona, University of Zawia, Sebha University, Tobruk University, Gulf of Sidra University, University of Tripoli, Higher Institute for Science and Technology Studies of Sabratha.
https://hgraproject.eu/