The Crash team had the pleasure of welcoming Benjamin Boudou, politician and researcher at the Max Planck Institute, for a conference-debate on November 26, 2018. The meeting was prepared and moderated by Michaël Neuman.

Alors que le dernier navire humanitaire en Méditerranée, l'Aquarius, est maintenu à quai à Marseille et pourrait bien rester longtemps immobilisé selon les vœux des autorités italiennes, un groupe de naufragés vient d'être débarqué de force en Libye. Débat sur la crise migratoire avec Michaël Neuman ; Catherine Wihtol de Wenden, Politologue, Directrice de recherche émérite au CNRS ; Olivier WEBER, écrivain et grand reporter ; Pierre-Henri DUMONT, Député du Pas-de-Calais (7e circonscription) Les Républicains, Membre de la commission des affaires étrangères.

Migrants ou Réfugiés ? Le débat reste vif en Europe pour savoir comment qualifier les milliers de personnes qui arrivent quotidiennement sur les côtes méditerranéennes notamment. L’émission est l’occasion d’un débat sur l’état des secours en Méditerranée ainsi que sur l’accueil des migrants et des réfugiés en France. 

Numerous politicians, from Daniel Cohn-Bendit to Marine Le Pen and including Emmanuel Macron, denounce what they claim is collusion between organisations helping migrants (humanitarian workers) and smugglers (criminals). One group operates in full public view, the other out of sight, but both are said to be working together to help people illegally cross borders.

Humanitarian organisations coming to the rescue of migrants in the Mediterranean Sea are kindly required either to watch them drown or to hand them over to human traffickers and torturers. We have seen countless political statements, opinion polls and editorials on the need to take a harder line against African migrants and accusing NGOs of being the accomplices of “smugglers”. We have even heard it said that these NGOs are organising the departures of those aspiring to migrate to Europe coincide with the presence of a rescue ship, making relief workers conscious actors in a criminal enterprise.

Humanitarian aid organisations carrying out rescues at sea were made into the accomplices of human traffickers. This accusation is as absurd as it is unacceptable. Not only do rescue operations at sea save people from drowning, but they evacuate people in situations of immediate danger in Libya, MSF recalls.

Médecins Sans Frontières, Amnesty International, La Cimade et Médecins du Monde demandent à être reçues par Emmanuel Macron après ses critiques contre l’ONG allemande Lifeline. Une déclaration qui marque une étape supplémentaire dans le cynisme et l’hypocrisie de la politique migratoire française selon ces associations qui déplorent aussi que l’on criminalise les bénévoles. 

Thanks to the migrant crisis, or the reception crisis as it would be more appropriate to call it, the issue of hospitality is back in the forefront. On 17 May, the Maison des Métallos organised a conference with two social science researchers - Michel Agier and Benjamin Boudou - and an NGO manager Cécile Poletti to discuss existing tensions between private hospitality and public hospitality.