Drowned Baby Picture Captures Week Of Tragedy In Mediterranean

[LebaneseDude 6,146]

Warning: This may be a little too much for some people.

Spoiler

A photograph of a drowned migrant baby in the arms of a German rescuer was distributed on Monday by a humanitarian organization aiming to persuade European authorities to ensure safe passage to migrants, after hundreds are feared to have drowned in the Mediterranean last week.

The baby, who appears to be no more than a year old, was pulled from the sea on Friday after the capsizing of a wooden boat. Forty-five bodies arrived in the southern Italian port of Reggio Calabria on Sunday aboard an Italian navy ship, which picked up 135 survivors from the same incident.

German humanitarian organization Sea-Watch, operating a rescue boat in the sea between Libya and Italy, distributed the picture taken by a media production company on board and which showed a rescuer cradling the child like a sleeping baby.

In an email, the rescuer, who gave his name as Martin but did not want his family name published, said he had spotted the baby in the water “like a doll, arms outstretched”.

“I took hold of the forearm of the baby and pulled the light body protectively into my arms at once, as if it were still alive ... It held out its arms with tiny fingers into the air, the sun shone into its bright, friendly but motionless eyes.”

The rescuer, a father of three and by profession a music therapist, added: “I began to sing to comfort myself and to give some kind of expression to this incomprehensible, heart-rending moment. Just six hours ago this child was alive.”

Like the photograph of the three-year-old Syrian boy Aylan lying lifeless on a Turkish beach last year, the image puts a human face on the more than 8,000 people who have died in the Mediterranean since the start of 2014.

Read the rest here: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-europe-migrants-baby-idUSKCN0YL18P

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What do you think about this situation? 

[Manul 7,377]

I can't think, I feel heartbroken.

[Didymus 34,380]

I think we need to try to stop people from getting on these boats. In a way it's important for Europeans to note that so many people are willing to risk their lives to come here, but surely enough people have drowned by now.

I agree with Sea-Watch.

[mcphee 1,790]

That is heartbreaking

[littlepotter 76,610]

1 hour ago, Didymus said:

I think we need to try to stop people from getting on these boats. In a way it's important for Europeans to note that so many people are willing to risk their lives to come here, but surely enough people have drowned by now.

I agree with Sea-Watch.

The problem is that they don't have much of a choice. Don't you think they know what they are risking? Even if there were a 0.01% chance of survival, they'd take it over being publicly executed by ISIS, which has become a common occurence.

God I feel so terrible for them. And terrified, because virtually nothing stops them from doing the same to my city.

[Didymus 34,380]

8 hours ago, littlepotter said:

The problem is that they don't have much of a choice. Don't you think they know what they are risking?

Like I said, I agree with Sea-Watch. They're calling for Europe to provide safe and legal passage for them, not necessarily because they're so in favor of migration, but because it's a much more efficient way of shutting down these smuggling practices.