Italians divided over Banksy-funded rescue boat for migrants

Street artist Banksy has divided opinion in Italy after a rescue boat he is funding became overloaded with migrants.

Migrants on board the Sea-Watch 4 rescue ship after it took more than 150 people from the MV Louise Michel rescue vessel funded by Banksy. Picture: AFP

Street artist Banksy has divided opinion in Italy after a rescue boat he is funding in the Mediterranean became overloaded with migrants.

The Italian coastguard came to the aid of MV Louise Michel after it said it was unable to manoeuvre safely. It was towing ­migrants in a liferaft, along with the body of a dead companion.

The 31m ship, a former French customs patrol boat, offloaded 49 of the most vulnerable on to the coastguard ship and another 180 to Sea-Watch 4, a larger German charity ship.

Banksy’s decision to buy and operate the boat has put him at the heart of Italy’s migrant crisis.

The passengers taken off Louise Michel were transported to the Italian island of Lampedusa, where their presence heightened ill feeling. The island is struggling to cope with more than 1500 ­migrants, with 450 arriving at the weekend in a large wooden fishing boat.

Migrants stand on the Louise Michel, a rescue ship funded by British street artist Banksy. Picture: AFP

Lampedusa mayor Salvatore Martello said he would call for a general strike to protest against Rome’s perceived indifference to the plight of the island.

“We’ll be pulling down the shutters. The national government continues to maintain a frightening silence. Can someone remind (Prime Minister Giuseppe) Conte that Lampedusa is Italian?” Mr Martello said.

About 30 other small boats, mostly from the Tunisian coast, had already reached the island since Friday carrying around 500 migrants, the Italian media reported.

Banksy is popular in Italy but the response to his initiative underlines how polarised the nation has become on the subject of immigration.

Conservative newspaper Il Giornale accused the artist of “speaking in slogans” and failing to understand the complexity of migration.

Louise Michel, named after a 19th century French anarchist, began its first mission from the Spanish port of Burriana on ­August 18.

Sprayed bright pink with a fire extinguisher by Banksy and featuring the image of a small girl in a lifevest holding a heart-shaped life ring, its operators have taken an aggressive approach to what they see as the culpable negligence of the EU.

“The people have sat in a mix of salt water and fuel for days. It is night and European states are not doing their f..king job,” said Lea Reisner, head of operations at an early phase of the voyage.

The boat was bought with the proceeds of the sale of art and is crewed by a rescue professionals from across Europe. “She runs on a flat hierarchy and a vegan diet,” the operators said.

The artist presented the venture in a video with images cutting from huge pleasure yachts to ­migrants foundering in water. “Like most people who make it in the art world, I bought a yacht to cruise the Med,” the accompanying captions say.

“It’s a French Navy vessel we converted into a lifeboat because the EU authorities deliberately ignore distress calls from ‘non-­Europeans’.” The video ends with the slogan: “All Black Lives Matter.”

Claire Faggianelli, of the collective responsible for transforming the boat, said Banksy had emailed to congratulated them on the rescues.

Giovanni Orsina, professor of contemporary history at LUISS University in Rome, said he thought Banksy’s initiative would push people from Italy’s non-ideological centre towards the anti-immigrant League of Matteo Salvini.

“A rich Englishman is using a foreign boat to deposit migrants in Italy. It seems perfectly calculated to deepen the gulf ­between rich progressives and those who suffer the consequences of their policies.”

A reader of the Giornale di ­Sicilia said: “It would be much better if he managed to take all the immigrants directly to ­England, a very civilised country with much better employment prospects.”

UN refugee agency UNHCR said attempts by migrant boats to cross the Mediterranean into ­Europe have increased this year, up 91 per cent from last year, to more than 14,000 people.

The Times