Compass or app? Thus, migrants hide during the journey

Recent data from the Ministry of Interior revealed that the number of departures from Tunisia compared with those from Libya. Indeed, looking at the first three months of the year, it looks like it 12083 immigrants More than 170 left from the Tunisian coast from the beginning of the year until March 13 illegal immigrants They land every day, which amounts to an increase of 788% compared to the 1,360 arrivals in the same period in 2022. More than 12,000 migrants from Tunisia are more than a third of the 32,101 people of the Tunisian route who arrived in Italy in all of 2022. We have seen the talks that took place between migrants still in Tunisia and those who, on the other hand, have already arrived in Italy, collecting information on their condition. Crossings management.

In particular, in view of the upcoming “caravans” that will leave Sfax in the next few days, one of the organizers organized a “meeting” to orient migrants, in particular on the correct use of telephones on board sea vessels departing from Sfax. Specifically, the participants discussed the best way to orient themselves at sea between a compass and the apps installed on smartphones. There seem to be two different schools of thought in this regard. “there compass It is the only tool that the Navy cannot locateOne of the organizers claimed, upholding the precautionary principle to prevent the signal from being tracked by the GPS systems of law enforcement agencies when the small boat is in Tunisian waters. The reason for which he advised all migrants to put the phone in flight mode before starting the journey.

“The compass often loses its bearings on the water, I know what I’m talking about, right there application And if you have it, you don’t need a compassAn emigrant who, according to him, arrived in Lampedusa in recent days, immediately answered: “As long as the carrier does not follow the road for three minutes, he is lost, which is why he stays at sea for three days“.

Then he added:To avoid this, the ‘souraka’ have a tracking app they install on their phone, which takes them straight to Lampedusa, without even using a compassHowever, the regulator points out that “If we talk about an application, then it is on a smartphone and it is Easy to spot for the navy. Personally, I believe that the compass is the best in terms of direction at sea and has been in use since the dawn of time“.

But the app supporter states that there should be only one active phone on the edge of the punt, because “The navy detects waves when there are a lot of them“In this way, he said, there is only one active and there are many fishermen in the sea,”Navy can’t find the differencesBetween small migrant boats and fishing boats.application defines you It shows you its destination, which is LampedusaExplaining that fishermen also use it, al-Muhajir says:Every good ‘souraka’ knows this and works offlineMany asked for the name of the application, but Al-Muhajir was reluctant to reveal it.Any good ‘souraka’ knows that, he’s the one who installs it in the phone and does the tracking“.

He then adds, explaining the rationale for the application: “If you rely only on a compass, you will get lost in the water at the slightest mistake. The usual time to arrive in Lampedusa is between eight and ten in the evening. We left at five in the morning, were 30 km from Lampedusa and met Italian Coast Guardwho came to us to recover“.