SOS Mediterranee Wins 'Alternative Nobel Prize'
The maritime rescue group has won the Right Livelihood Award for its life-saving missions helping imperiled migrants on the Mediterranean Sea.
The maritime rescue group has won the Right Livelihood Award for its life-saving missions helping imperiled migrants on the Mediterranean Sea.Thousands of people trying to make their way to Europe drown in the Mediterranean Sea every year. In 2022, more than 2,400 people lost their lives, according to the UN refugee agency UNHCR, though no one knows the exact number for sure.
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Without non-governmental organization SOS Mediterranee, that total would likely be a whole lot higher. The European humanitarian group claims to have rescued some 36,000 people in trouble at sea since they began their patrols.
Prizewinners drive home humanitarian crisis
For these efforts, SOS Mediterranee was handed the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes dubbed the "Alternative Nobel Prize," on Thursday. Once a year, the Swedish foundation of the same name confers its prize to individuals and organizations that work for peace, sustainability or a more just world.
When it came to SOS Mediterranee, the prize-givers explained that the organization does more than just save lives. Time and time again, the group has sensitized the public about the humanitarian crisis in the Mediterranean, not to mention European political institutions.
Their inaction was apparently what prompted German Captain Klaus Vogel and French anthropologist Sophie Beau to set up the organization in 2015, bringing together people from France, Italy, Germany and Switzerland. Since 2019, their rescue vessel "Ocean Viking" has been patrolling the Mediterranean.
A wake-up call for politicians and the public
SOS Mediterranee's goal was to step up where state institutions were failing to save lives at sea. In late 2014, the Italian naval and air operation that saved tens of thousands of lives, Mare Nostrum, had wound down. Later missions organized by the European Union have focused on preventing people smuggling and not saving people in jeopardy at sea.
In an interview with the German daily newspaper Tagesspiegel in July 2021, co-founder Vogel said he had hoped at the time to be able to shake up politics with the initiative. (On January 1, 2022, the German offshoot of SOS Méditerranée split off from the alliance and renamed itself SOS Humanity, according to its own statements).
In recent years, according to UNHCR, state institutions in the EU have significantly scaled back maritime rescue and private organizations have taken over their duties. Moreover, these groups frequently flag the increasing difficulties they face when dealing with authorities.
Caroline Abu Sa'da from the Swiss office of SOS Mediteranee said she was pleased the prize would help raise awareness to the plight of thousands of people risking their lives. That is another of SOS Mediterranee's goals – to ensure the voices of those rescued don't go unheard.
This article was originally published in German.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Sep 28, 2023 12:00 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).