“I was not afraid of the water, because God created the water. I’m not afraid of death. We all die one day. I’m more afraid if the Libyan police were to catch me again, because they are so wicked,” the 21 year-old Nigerian told newsmen after she was rescued.
She was in the the group of migrants to arrive at Sicilian city Catania on Thursday, which included six women, 32 teenagers and six children. It could not be ascertained the number of other Nigerians in the group.
She told the AFP that she had been in Libya for just over a year before setting off last weekend. She said that she had spent nearly six months in dreadful conditions in a Libyan prison after a failed first crossing last year. The country’s notorious detention centres have been blasted by human rights groups and the United Nations as “inhuman.”
Vitoria was one of those who had been on the Aquarius rescue ship, chartered by SOS Méditerranee and Medecins Sans Frontieres, since Monday night, after being saved on Sunday by a smaller boat; the Astral, run by a Spanish NGO following a call from the Italian coastguard.
More than 100 migrants were rescued off the coast of Libya in the operation, but they became stranded in the central Mediterranean for three days during a diplomatic standoff between Rome and London. Rome decided this week to allow the 105 people to land in Italy following a back-and-forth with British authorities over who should take them. Nearly 700,000 people have landed on Italian shores since 2013.
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