MSF calls for the evacuation of the most vulnerable migrants from Libya to safe countries

"In Libya, the majority of migrants are victims of arbitrary detention, torture, and violence, including sexual violence,” says Claudia Lodesani, MSF Operations manager for Libya. "They have extremely limited possibilities of obtaining physical and legal protection. As a result, the deadly migration route [across] the Mediterranean sea is often their only way out. We believe that safe countries, especially in the European Union (EU)—which has been funding the Libyan coastguard for years and encouraging the forced return of migrants to Libya—have a duty to facilitate the evacuation of these victims of violence and to protect them.”

Since the beginning of MSF’s humanitarian response addressing the needs of migrants in Libya in 2016,  MSF teams have been confronted with the impossibility of protecting  people from harm and difficulty of ensuring continuity of medical care for those with the most severe physical and mental health conditions, including victims of torture—both in detention centers and in the community.

MSF’s report presents various alternative solutions to arbitrary detention in Libya, including those initiated by aid organizations in association with some governments. In Italy, a humanitarian corridor has already been opened to enable the evacuation of a number of highly vulnerable people in need of protection, including patients treated by MSF in Libya. In France, discussions between MSF and authorities are underway to evacuate survivors of torture and violence as well as people with serious medical conditions. Those evacuated in this way would be taken care of by MSF on their arrival in France. MSF calls for this type of mechanism to be duplicated in other safe countries.

"The medical care of people who are arbitrarily and indefinitely detained, or at risk of systematic violence, poses many dilemmas,” said Jérôme Tubiana, MSF advocacy manager for Libya. “Realistically, what we can do to help them in Libya is limited. To truly protect the most vulnerable people, we must first and foremost urgently get them out of the detention system and out of the country."

MSF is one of the few international nongovernmental organizations working in Libya. MSF’s teams provide general health care and psychosocial support to migrants held in detention centers and living in makeshift housing. MSF also organizes the transfer of more seriously ill people to hospital and helps those who wish to do so to register for the UNHCR and IOM’s programs to help them leave the country.