Sébastien Le Belzic // Photo credit: FILIPPO MONTEFORTE / AFP 10:06 am, September 19, 2023, modified at 10:08 am, September 19, 2023

The situation on the Italian island of Lampedusa continues to be a cause for concern. On this small piece of land located in the middle of the Mediterranean, the inhabitants feel more and more distant from Europe in the face of the migration crisis, while tourists are gradually leaving the island.

Lampedusa, a small Italian island lost in the middle of the Mediterranean, has been in the news in recent days. In question, the arrival in just a few days of thousands of migrants on this small territory. Lampedusa has been a gateway to Europe for several years, for many migrants from Africa in search of a better life.

But on the island, locals feel helpless. This piece of land lives only from tourism and fishing. Because with its turquoise blue sea and postcard landscapes, Lampedusa has all the assets to be a small paradise on earth for tourists. On the waterfront, boat rental companies are waiting impatiently for customers. Matteo owns a small sailboat with which he walks tourists who come to observe sea turtles.

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The boats of the smugglers rub shoulders with the few tourists still present

"Many tourists have already left because they are afraid," he told Europe 1. Despite ever more laws and a strengthening of Frontex, Europe's border control system, migrants are flocking to the island. Proof of this is that a few meters away, the boats abandoned by the smugglers are stranded along the quays, and old blankets, plastic bottles and Red Cross tents are left there, right next to the beaches where a few tourists are still installed.

Feeling abandoned

Mikaël no longer expects anything from Europe. The island where he was born 30 years ago is no longer a paradise but just a gateway for migrants, he said. "I'm not the right person to say how the EU can help us. But what I think is that it's their responsibility and their job to come up with the solutions to get us out of there," he said.

If he does not blame anyone, the inhabitant of the island says he is distraught. Now in Lampedusa, in the middle of the Mediterranean, you feel very far from the rest of Europe.