When children, women, and men escape the torture camps in Libya via the Mediterranean Sea, something odd seems to happen, more frequently now than before. The names ascribed to them change, as if the passage through the sea and their growing proximity to Europe altered their identity. The rescued were not migrants but pirates who had hijacked the tanker. Quite the opposite is the case: despite its fluidity, the Mediterranean Sea is continuously turned into a “hard” border, with European states and E.U. But when these survivors board boats, they turn from those who have experienced unimaginable cruelty into migrant pirates.

Source: The North Africa Journal April 03, 2019 09:22 UTC