TRANSLATION TROUBLES

 I have worked as both a translator and an interpreter and I know how hard it is, so my heart went out to Valentina Maiolini-Rothbacher, the interpreter whose session at the White House with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and President Trump went horribly wrong last Thursday.

In the clip, we are not shown the whole conversation and we cannot see where exactly the interpreter was or what equipment, if any, she had. However, we can hear the panic in her voice as she struggles to keep up with the conversation and she almost referred to signora Meloni as "president", only just managing to correct the word to "prime minister" in time. (In Italian the prime minister's title is Presidente del Consiglio dei ministri and it does cause confusion to English speakers.) This is not a mistake that one would expect an experienced interpreter to make. It is just after this point that Meloni becomes exasperated and interrupts her, saying, "Faccio io" ("I'll do it"), which she did, and very well. I understand her frustration and the interpreter has since said that the prime minister had been right to interrupt.

But what happened? Ms Maiolini-Rothbacher, distressed the next morning at finding her name splashed all over the Italian press (with the foreign newspapers following suit later) said that she did not know what had happened to her brain but also that the room had been crowded, from which we can infer that there was extraneous noise, which there should not have been. We also do not know how long the conversation had gone on before the interruption or whether the interlocutors had simply not paused  for the interpreter to speak. (Simultaneous translation is particularly difficult and at the UN interpreters alternate every twenty minutes or so, because the pressure of the job is so high.) Or perhaps it was just a poor translation set-up from the beginning.

I understand that Ms Maiolini-Rothbacher's mother tongue is Italian, so why was she interpreting from that language into the target language of English? This is not how interpreters usually work.

Prime Minister Meloni's English is good but that said, very few statesmen or stateswomen are linguists, which may partly explain what is wrong with the world. Reliance on interpreters must be frustrating at times but it is necessary. That, in my opinion, is partly what caused the upset at the White House for President Zelensky, who has excellent English but is not a native speaker and there were matters he could have discussed more tactfully. I have noticed that he has been using interpreters since that incident.

In English in particular, a misplaced tone, a wrong preposition and especially an erroneous stress pattern could be disastrous in an international negotiation or a business or legal situation. Here is an example:

"I'm going to drop nuclear bombs" with stress on "drop" and slight pause before "nuclear" = "I'm going to stop using nuclear bombs."

"I'm going to drop nuclear bombs" with no pause and stress on "bombs" = "I'm going to destroy the world."

I hear your question: "What about AI?" It is my understanding that in the publishing world a non-fiction book can be translated using AI very quickly indeed and copies can be on sale almost simultaneously with the original but I would have doubts regarding the quality of such translations. Fiction, however, is another matter because it depends on tone, style, nuance, imagery and so many other literary techniques. It is also important to be able to convey the author's particular "voice".

There are some horrific examples of AI translations or transcriptions on video clips and in one clip from a 1950s US comedy series (a transcription of English subtitles) a character called Ethel has her name written as "arsehole"because the AI programme is transcribing what it thinks it hears. If you are ever introduced to someone whose name is Ethel and you say, "Hello, Arsehole" I do not think her reply will be very friendly!

Going back to the White House interpreting scene, I hope that Ms Maiolini-Rothbacher is feeling a little better. News moves so fast these days that the world will have forgotten the incident soon. I just wish that more people, particularly those whose job is to set up translation or interpreting situations, understood how demanding this work can be.

AMID THE MADNESS

The world appears to have gone mad, so let us pause and gaze upon something that takes time, patience and art - from the Cicara Caffetteria in Modica:

I also marked my birthday at the Cicara last week and was presented with a lovely, miniature cheesecake dessert:

A seventy-fifth birthday is a landmark of sorts and the occasion set me thinking about how different it was from my seventieth, just before the first Covid lockdown in Italy. In my memoir, I began my chapter on that period in this way:

Two days before my seventieth birthday in February I sat in my local bar celebrating with friends. It was to be three long, miserable, terrifying months before I would see friends or sit in a bar again. Within days, all of Italy was in lockdown.

In abnormal times, we long for the "normal", even the mundane, so what can we do? I now feel neither young nor brave enough to weather the social media backlash and pile-ons that publicly expressing all my thoughts on world events would entail, though I am working on my lack of courage. I would, however, call out prejudice and unfairness when I see them in my own environment. Other than that, I can take pleasure in the day to day small things in life, I can thank those who provide them and I can be kind. That, I think, is a beginning.

A LETTER TO BRITAIN

Modica, Italy

13^th December 2019

Dearest Britain,

A park in Norwich, Norfolk

I don't live in you now and, though I left you 15 years ago for another country that had captured my heart, that doesn't mean I no longer love you, for it was you that bore me, nurtured me, educated and made me and there will always be a British girl inside the continental me. I write now because what happened to you yesterday was shocking, devastating, frightening and deeply upsetting; its consequences cannot be foreseen at this juncture, but 24 hours on they seem bleak. I may still love you – I always will – but I no longer recognise you.

The country I left was far from perfect and our imperialist past was not something that most of us boasted about. Of course there was racism, as there is everywhere and I witnessed it myself, but it also seemed to me that it was generally understood that democracy means that you cannot impinge upon the freedom of others. When exactly did that change? When did people begin to believe that they could make whatever anti-foreigner, anti-gay, anti-woman, anti-elderly, anti-you-name-it comment they liked with impunity – in one of the most diverse and tolerant countries in the world? I am too far away to know and I doubt you know yourself but it has happened. Tolerance, it seems, has gone and soon it could be followed off our little group of islands by accountability in the “Mother of Parliaments”, the independence of the judiciary and perhaps even the constitutional monarchy.

When you see your own country from afar, you are unable to balance your pessimism regarding events there with a healthy dose of observation of your countrymen and women just getting on with their normal lives, but I would guess that what happened is simply that democracy is fragile and, having enjoyed it for so long, we took our eye off the ball. Then the 2008 recession gave the charlatans the opportunity they had been waiting for to exploit discontent. And you fell for it, my country. Not having known an occupation within living memory, you failed to see the danger when it came and you are failing to understand it now. This tide will turn, of course, whether peacefully or not I cannot say, and I certainly would not hazard a guess as to how long it will take.

So let us think back for a moment to a generation, that of my parents, who did recognise a serious threat to their freedom, for what I really want to talk about tonight are memories. Whenever I fly back to you, Britain, as the plane comes in over the Channel and Kent, I think first of Folkestone, a town of which I have no memory but to which I was sent at the age of eight weeks – to an orphanage there, because my natural mother couldn't afford to keep me. (Do you really want to go back to that, Britain? A narrow, judgemental state in which single mothers are forced to give up their children? It seems that you do, judging from remarks made by the now re-elected Prime Minister.) Seven months later, in the cold November of 1950, two kind, loving people who longed for a baby – a Bristol newsagent and his wife, both of Welsh origin – visited that orphanage in Folkestone and they drove back to Bristol with an extra passenger - me. My bond with the man who had just become my father was instant and I miss him to this day. I was told that I also went willingly into my mother's arms but took longer about it!

As the plane nears London, I look down and try to get my geographical bearings of that enormous city and its outskirts and I remember that somewhere down there I went to school, accompanied my big-hearted, generous but flawed dad to both casinos and Gamblers Anonymous meetings (somewhere near Buckingham Palace), became part-Londoner and grew up. Also down there his ashes mingled with my mum's, in the Ruislip Garden of Remembrance named after the only English Pope, Nicholas Breakspear. I only went back there once after their respective funerals (twenty years apart), on the 25^th anniversary of my dad's death and I learnt that they were not there, for they are where I am. If I hadn't known that, I would have been unable to leave.

Westminster Abbey

They sat in their North London Garden, the girl and her dad, and he spoke to her sometimes in Latin, sometimes in French and he bequeathed to her his love and knowledge of books. Without him, she would not have become a linguist. He also bequeathed to her his humour, his quintessentially British irony and his gift for repartee. They served her well as a teacher and they serve her well now, when humour is all there is, she thinks, to help her deal with the situation.

Chronic illness had prevented dad from fighting (much to his frustration), so back in Bridgend, Wales, he had worked in the Arsenal, then in Bristol hosted American soldiers and joined the Home Guard. He and mum had been horrified by fascism and, like many of his era, he had, before what was always referred to as “The War”, been a member of the Communist Party because it was thought to be the only way to stop Hitler. Later, disillusioned, he left it and received threats for doing so. During the war and during our Bristol years he worshipped Churchill. That was a different kind of Conservatism, though – a party of the rich for the rich, yes, but there was a sense of decency and of responsibility for the fate of their fellow-Britons. In London during the Heath premiership, dad switched his allegiance to the Labour Party because, he said, they cared for the ordinary worker.

Dad (second from left) in the Bridgend Arsenal

My journey from the airport usually continues by coach and down we go, towards the South-West. I still have a sense of childish excitement when I see the motorway signs to “The South-West and Wales”. It's best before evening, when you can still see the green on either side, and as we near Bristol I muse that in some of these fields, cut through by the very road I am travelling on, the little girl and her dad used to go mushroom-hunting. Then she became a teenager and suddenly she was hurtling along the nearby country lanes in her boyfriend's car. She wept and wept when they left for London in the spring of 1965.

And now we come to the Bridge - the span across the River Severn which takes you into Wales. And Wales it is which gives me my real British identity. I grew up among its gentle accents, heard and sang its music every day, assimilated its culture and regarded it always as “home”. As you cross the Bridge you can still see the loading point for the old Aust ferry, which (if you were lucky) took you across before the miracle of the First Severn Bridge. (If you are unfamiliar with that part of Britain, you may be interested to know that the Severn has the third highest tidal range in the world. Hence the two bridges across it that now exist are true feats of engineering.) Sometimes you queued for hours, only to be told that they could take no more cars across that evening, either because of the current or because of the time, and then you had to get into Wales by driving “all around bloody Gloucestershire” as dad would bad-temperedly put it. Once in Wales, we were home and we stayed with my uncle and aunt or in the Cardiff Central Hotel owned by dad's cousin Frank. Years later, as a university student, I spent many drunken nights in its bar – Frank, the hotel guests and its staff had long gone – and later still it was all destroyed by fire. Wales was, and is, the sound of kindly, sing-songy voices, the land of the cwtch (cuddle - and believe me, there's nothing like a Welsh one), the aroma of Welshcakes cooking on a bakestone, a carpet of daffodils in March and April and the land of childhood warmth.

In Wales you'll find daffodils even when there aren't any!
Here, daffodil ornaments are on sale
 at Cardiff Christmas Market

But now I make another journey on these rare trips home: from Cardiff to Norwich, or sometimes straight from London to Norwich, another town of which I have no childhood memory, and yet it is where it all began. For that is where I was born and spent such a short time with my natural mother, who already had a three-year-old daughter called Jill, my sister. How we met after 64 years is a story I have told elsewhere but it is in Norwich that my British life comes full circle and yes, I do have a strange sense there, too, of coming home, of having been there before. Sadly I can only visit my natural mother at her graveside and I take her Welsh daffodils or, at this time of year, a little Christmas tree, and I hope she knows that Jill and I are there together. I have come to love Norwich in its own right, too – its lanes, the glory of its Cathedral, which I have found to be welcoming, and the peace of the nearby Broads.

A peaceful morning in Norwich

A Christmas tree for my natural mother

And on the way there I cross London again and remember other times, fashions and events, both in its life as a city and in my own.

To borrow from Rupert Brooke, all these things I have loved in you, Britain and, even though I do not recognise you now in your national life, they endure, for no politician can take my memories, though age may do so. Therefore I set them down now, for I want you to know that I have loved you, and I hope that you will come through this dark period as you have come through others – stronger, more determined to preserve what is good and, hopefully, kinder – and that if I do not live to see it, others will.

SIGNING FOR AMATRICE

Last night on this blog I expressed the hope that something good would come out of last week's G7 summit in Taormina and here's a positive development from a project that even its creators didn't really expect to take off:

The enterprising owners of the clothing store La Pagoda in Taormina's Corso Umberto decided to display a canvas with portraits of the G7 leaders on it in the hope that some of them would sign it. They were quite surprised when President Macron, the First Ladies of Italy and Japan and Justin Trudeau stopped by to do so. You can see a video of President Macron signing the canvas and having a chat here.

The canvas will now be auctioned and the funds raised will go to Amatrice, the town devastated by the earthquake of 24.8.16 and which was struck again on 26.10.16. President Trudeau found time to visit Amatrice on Sunday in a gesture of solidarity.

A WEEK OF CONTRASTS

Italian G7 Presidency 2017

Tortelli with basil and pecorino in a Sicilian red prawn sauce; sea bream with cherry tomatoes and a basket of steamed vegetables; cannolo, cassata and "seven veils" ice cream; ice cream and brioche for breakfast - these were just some of the sumptuous Sicilian dishes enjoyed by the G7 leaders, their first ladies and the first husband at Taormina last week. At the same time, a MSF ship carrying 1,446 migrants who had been saved from 12 inadequate boats in the Mediterranean was not permitted to dock in any Sicilian port because of security measures in place from 22nd - 28th May for the summit. This meant that the ship was at sea for 48 instead of 30 hours and ran out of food and water. As the situation became truly desperate and a hygiene emergency developed on board as a consequence, the ship was allowed to pick up supplies at Palermo but no one was able to disembark. The ship finally docked at Naples on 28th May.

Paragraphs 24 and 25 of the G7 comuniqué make interesting reading, as while all this was going on in the very sea that served as a backdrop for the leaders' jolly photos, they promised to uphold "the human rights of all migrants and refugees." It is worth remembering that this meeting took place two days after 34 people had died in the Mediterranean, including seven children.  

The leaders have returned to their homes now, but there is no end to the scenes of devastation for those who have no home:  Yesterday 252 migrants were brought to Pozzallo. Of these, 135 had been on an overcrowded migrant dinghy which had sailed from Libya.  The middle section of the boat began to break up and 25 migrants fell into the sea. Two were rescued but sadly died later. One people trafficker has been arrested by Italian police in connection with the tragedy and a second alleged trafficker from another boat is in hospital. All the survivors are said to be in reasonable conditions of health and are being transferred to reception centres in other parts of Italy.

Some good, it is to be hoped, came out of the G7 and of course Italy had to put on its best show. The leaders were filmed strolling through the streets of a Taormina that had been cleared of all except residents and security personnel and they even visited a few shops. None of them, to my knowledge, visited a migrant centre.

La Repubblica reports today that 1,720 migrants have drowned in the Central Mediterranean this year and that 60,000 have attempted the crossing. Last week alone the Italian Coast Guard and other operatives saved 9,500 migrants in the Mediterranean.

LUNEDÌ MUSICALE

In view of events yesterday in another country close to my heart, I think I should post this. Vive la France!

Charles Aznavour et Zaz - J'aime Paris au mois de mai

PASCHAL TIDES

On this Easter Sunday, while most of us celebrated with friends and family, while a Queen, resplendent in turquoise, attended church, while a sportsman triumphantly drenched his teammates in champagne, while two statues met and kissed in Modica, a drama which operatives involved have described as "unprecedented" in its scale has been taking place in the Mediterranean and once again, people have died in it and are probably continuing to die as I write.

Calmer seas, the escalating war situation in Syria and the continual lack of hope in other countries of provenance have seen migrant boats leaving for Europe without cease and on Friday more than 2,000 migrants were reported to have been travelling in the Sicilian Channel. The Italian Coast Guard says that, in 19 operations involving 16 migrant dinghies and three small wooden boats, 2,074 migrants were saved. One teenager was found dead in one of the dinghies. The SOS Méditeranée ship Aquarius was last night bringing 500 of the rescued migrants, including three children under the age of five, to Pozzallo.

Early reports today said that at least 20 migrants had drowned off Libya in the preceding 24 hours but this was later corrected to seven. However, there are conflicting reports, probably because of the number of rescue operations necessary and the difficulties encountered in them, so the situation is still unclear. MOAS [Migrant Offshore Aid Station] had saved 1,500 people on nine boats since Saturday morning and, taking them on board their ship Phoenix, had to give priority to women, children and the sick.  Once capacity was reached at 453, they issued life jackets and supplies to the migrants still waiting for rescue on board their inadequate boats.  

In all 4,500 people were saved on Saturday and a MSF ship has taken 649 migrants, saved off Libya on Friday, to Calabria. Many of these migrants had signs of torture on their bodies and some had gunshot wounds. An eight-year-old boy is also  reported dead.

In this video of 7th April, Dr Pietro Bartolo of Lampedusa mentions what he calls the "illness of the dinghies", as witnessed by medics since the people traffickers have started using dinghies: this illness, which can lead to death, is caused by a mixture of petrol and water soaking migrants' clothes and causing burns.  It affects mostly the women, he says, as it is the women who tend to be crowded together sitting on the floor - a different sort of drenching, then, to the one inflicted by our friend the sportsman above.

Dr Bartolo also had strong words for Europe's leaders, saying that he does not understand why a great and civilised continent cannot deal with the migration crisis with intelligence and rationality but he puts it down to indifference rather than inability to act.

The other person who has uttered strong words about the migration tragedy is Pope Francis, who said the following at Friday's Easter Vigil in Rome:

"We can see the faces of those women* in any number of other faces: the faces of mothers and grandmothers, of children and young people who bear the grievous burden of injustice and brutality. In their faces, we can see reflected all those who, walking the streets of our cities, feel the pain of dire poverty, the sorrow born of exploitation and human trafficking. We can also see the faces of those who are greeted with contempt because they are immigrants, deprived of country, house and family.

Shame for all the scenes of devastation, destruction and drownings that have become ordinary in our lives."

* The two women Pope Francis refers to are Mary and Mary Magdalene as they visited the tomb of Jesus.

Update - 17.4.17 at 20.29:

UNHCR has said that the number of migrants saved in the Mediterranean by naval or NGO operatives from Friday to Sunday was a staggering 8,300.  It has now been confirmed that seven migrants were found dead. A pregnant woman was evacuated from a migrant boat last night and brought to hospital in Modica, where she is said to be in a very serious condition.
Source: La Repubblica

IN WHICH I GIVE UP!

Over the years, I have tried my best - I really have - to promote, whenever possible, a positive image of Sicily, to reassure readers that it is a safe and lovely place to visit and, above all, to dispel the stereotypes. Italy, however, is even better than Britain at shooting itself in the foot and the latest instance of this is the app distributed to accredited foreign journalists for next month's G7 summit in Taormina. This is the opening image of the app., which has been approved by the Italian government:

Not the Greek theatre in Taormina, the azure-violet sea that surrounds the island, the majesty of Etna, Sicilian food or wine or, as La Sicilia's editorial remarked this morning, Sicilian fishermen saving migrants in the Mediterranean but this, which to me looks, at best, like a Dolce & Gabbana fashion show gone wrong. Are we in the 1950s? What does this say about women and what does it say, for that matter, about Sicilian men in the 21st century? So much for former Prime Minister Renzi's announcement in October that this would be "a G7 characterised by themes concerning education, culture and Italian and Sicilian identity". 

The objections are being voiced thick and fast on social media, as they should be, and President of the Sicilian Regional Assembly Giovanni Ardizzone has announced that he is writing today to Prime Minister Gentiloni to demand that the image be withdrawn.

Italy, I give up!

Update - 12.4.17:  The offending image has been removed from the app., I am glad to say.

AN IRONY AND AN INITIATIVE - A MIGRATION POST

If I have been absent from this blog again, it is because, just like most of you, I imagine, the news of the past week has found me glued to my television screen and not in any positive way. Millions of words have been written about the shocking events themselves but I have seen little acknowledgement of the irony of wringing our hands over the treatment of children in a war-torn country and the refusal of many of our own countries to take in those very children - which brings me, again, to the theme of migration in the Mediterranean and its subsequent tragedies, which can only increase given the current situation.

On Friday 7th April the SOS Méditeranée ship Aquarius brought 432 migrants, including 77 minors, six of whom were aged between one and four and 59 of whom were unaccompanied, to Catania. The migrants had been saved by Aquarius and other ships from four migrant boats which had got into trouble off the coast of Libya.  Later the Italian Coast Guard ship Dattilo brought 1,131 migrants, saved in eight operations, to Catania along with one body. 

The above figures represent only a proportion of the migrants rescued in the Mediterranean every day and it is not unusual for as many as 3,000 to be saved in just 24 hours.  To the Italian Coast Guard, Navy and NGOs such as SOS Méditerranée falls, too, the tragic task of recovering and bringing into port the bodies of those whose journey of hope brought them, not to their hoped-for destination, but to death and I have chronicled the sad numbers over the years.

There is, however, some good news for migrants in a world that doesn't seem to care about them and this news comes from Italy where, on 29th March, Parliament passed a law to protect unaccompanied child migrants: from now on their treatment should be consistent all over Italy, they cannot be deported, will be appointed individual, trained guardians and will have the same rights to healthcare, education and other services as Italian children. UNICEF has called it "a historic law" and you can read more about it here.  Well done, Italy, for shining a light amid so much darkness.

According to figures released by the Italian Ministry of the Interior, 25,845 unaccompanied child migrants reached Italy in 2016 and 4,000 have arrived here since the beginning of 2017. This article reports that in 2016 one person in every 113 in the world was a refugee, internally displaced or seeking asylum - not a figure we can be proud of in the 21st century.

I ask again and I direct my question to the men and women in power:  how can the world express horror at what is happening to civilians in a war zone and, at the same time, attempt to push them back when they flee for their lives?

A TIME FOR EVERYTHING

If you are thinking that I have been somewhat absent from this blog of late, you are right, for a little thing called Brexit has been taking up much of my time and thoughts. Like most British expats  and, I imagine, most EU nationals currently resident in the UK, I find the situation very worrying indeed. My 23rd February post on this subject has had, to my surprise, over 22,000 views to date - a record for Sicily Scene - but I wish it hadn't been necessary to write it.

I spent most of yesterday - jubilantly called "Brexit Day" by the Brexiteers - in deep gloom but did raise my head for long enough to notice that the bars of Modica are starting to bring out traditionally made gelato again and what could I do but console myself with some?

The freshly squeezed orange juice I so love in autumn and winter has now disappeared, as no bar owner worthy of the name would sell you a glass of the stuff once he deems the oranges past their best but gelato is definitely back for the duration, if not of the Brexit process, at least until October! Yes, I can safely say that Brexit has driven me to gelato!

SPRING TIDES, 2017

A mere 36 hours have passed since the events that shocked the world happened in my country and already, as if their situation were not bad enough, migrants are being blamed in some quarters. I ask, as I have asked many times, what woman, knowing that she could go into labour at any moment, would step onto a totally inadequate, crowded boat and attempt a dangerous sea crossing if she had any choice? What kind of parents would take or put their children onto such a boat, knowing the risks? Who would gamble in such a way with their own life if there were any hope in their own country? Surely you do not have to be a psychology professor to work out the answer.

As I write tonight, up to 240 migrants are feared dead in yet another tragedy that has taken place on the "central Mediterranean route", that is, the one with Italy as its destination, which is again being favoured by people traffickers following the closure of the Balkan route. The tragedy happened when two migrant boats got into trouble off the Libyan coast on Wednesday and so far five bodies have been recovered. All five, presumably men, were aged 16 - 25 and had died from drowning. This news comes on the day when a Libyan court blocked a Memorandum of Understanding on migration between Italy and Libya.  At the same time, the court in question blocked further negotiations on the matter between the two countries. The reasons are too complicated to go into on this blog but you can find more details here.

With the spring comes better weather and with better weather come more migrant boats: at the weekend Italian operatives saved 3,315 people in 25 operations in 24 hours.  Subsequently 1,477 of these migrants were brought to Augusta. Three bodies were also recovered. In addition, the SOS Mediterranean ship Aquarius, working in conjunction with MSF, saved 946 migrants off the Libyan coast in nine operations coordinated by the Rome Coast Guard on Saturday - Sunday night. The migrants had been travelling in seven dinghies and two wooden boats.  These migrants were brought to Catania and on the way, a baby called Mercy was born after an eight-hour, difficult labour. The midwife who attended Mercy's mother on board the Aquarius said she must have been desperate to have undertaken the journey in her condition. Mercy, as you can see, is healthy and is said to be doing well. Who could look look at her and feel no compassion? 

However, for every "Mercy" born, hundreds die at sea - so many, over the years, that no one knows exactly what the figure is and worse, the world does not seem to care. I am as upset by the London attack as anyone not directly involved but please, politicians and right-wing media, don't blame migrants.

In 2015 4,600 people died on the central Mediterranean migrant route and more than 10,000 are estimated to have died attempting this journey since 2014.

BREXIT - A VIEW FROM ITALY [2]

Most of my regular readers will know that I view Brexit as a disaster and I explained why on the night of the referendum. I have to say that my spirits have not risen regarding the matter since then and I have spent the past few days in shock and disbelief at what the UK Prime Minister said in her "Brexit Plan" speech on Tuesday.

What, though, is the general view in Italy?  We all know that members of the European Parliament- with a few exceptions including one notable British one - are fuming but reactions within Italy have generally been calmer than those in many other EU countries. But then, the Italians have not yet been insulted by Mr. Johnson. 

To say that the Prime Minister's speech went down well here would, however, be overstaing the case and the threatening tone she used towards the end of it did her no favours. Il Giornale di Sicilia asked how the UK can expect to enjoy free trade with the EU post-Brexit but not contribute to the EU budget and commenters on the article ranged from those who called us selfish and wanted us "chucked out now" to those who congratulated us upon "freeing" ourselves.

Several papers highlighted the fact that work permits are likely to be necessary for Italians working in Britain post-Brexit and it is ironic that this comes from a country that still demands documentation which should not be necessary under European law for non-Italian EU residents here. 

La Repubblica reported that we are going for "hard Brexit" and will therefore be "out of everything". Il Sole 24 Ore called our insistence on border control and withdrawal from the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice the "British Maginot Line" and I empathise with the incredulity implied - freedom of movement of people is, after all, one of the founding principles of the EU and we signed up to the organisation in full knowledge of that.

Alessandro Barbera, writing in La Stampa yesterday and referring to Mrs May's Davos speech [she's having a busy week!] asks how we can close our borders and, at the same time, claim to be a champion of free trade. He suggests that Mrs May, "the new Iron Lady", dreams of a "global Britain" but would rather it wasn't too global. Spot on, I'd say!

Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni has been measured in his comments, welcoming a commitment from May to cooperate militarily with the EU [made prior to Tuesday's speech and I can find no details as to the extent of such cooperation] and saying that Italy would discuss the issues with Britain in a spirit of solidarity and friendship.

Meanwhile Italian Foreign Minister Angelino Alfano said, while Mrs May was speaking on Tuesday, that the Italian government will defend the interests of Italians living and working in the UK. Now wouldn't it be nice if the "new Iron Lady" showed such concern for British citizens living and working in other EU countries?  

THE GREAT PROSECCO WAR

Some of you may know that, while we weren't looking and as if the world doesn't have enough problems, a "Prosecco war" broke out this week, so I thought I'd tell you how this event is viewed from here:

First of all, it is a given in a country that is a firm member of the EU that free movement of people is part of the package. So when the British Foreign Secretary, Boris Johnson, said that Brexit Britain wants to retain access to the European Single Market without subscribing to free movement of people, Carlo Calenda, the Italian Economic Development Minister, was aghast.

Mr Calenda told Mr Johnson that without free movement of people there would be nothing left to negotiate, to which Mr Johnson reportedly replied that Italy would give in on this rather than lose sales of Prosecco to the UK. An understandably annoyed Mr Calenda retorted that Britain would lose fish and chips exports but that the difference was that, whilst Italy might lose a little export buiness with one country, the UK stood to lose a lot more with 27 countries.

Later Mr Calenda remarked that it was "a bit offensive" of the British to assume that Italy is totally reliant on Prosecco exports and also said that the British government appears to be in chaos regarding Brexit policy.

This morning the Foreign Office issued the following statement, which is being taken as an apology here:

"The comments of the Foreign Secretary reflect the strength of the trading relationship between our two countries. We hope that this will remain strong despite British exit from the EU."

A British government source apparently told the BBC that Mr Johnson had not intended his comments as an insult but as part of a "constructive discussion".

The verdict in Italy is that the British are clearly off their [Prosecco-filled] trolley and, according to La Repubblica, that Mr Johnson is "not cut out for diplomacy".  Il Giornale, meanwhile, believes that the incident has pushed tragicomedy to its limits.

Prosecco, anyone?  Cincin!

AUTUMN TIDES 2016 - 2

With the eyes of the world very much on events in Calais this week, the plight of migrants attempting the Mediterranean crossing to reach Europe has once again been largely forgotten by the international media. Yet it goes on, changing weather conditions render it even more dangerous and someone, somewhere, it seems, always profits from tragedy.

On Wednesday - Thursday night 51 people died in the Sicilian Channel because, according to survivors, a rough sea had caused the inadequate dinghies they were travelling on to capsize. Of the 339 survivors brought to Augusta, 25 were women and 31 were unaccompanied minors. Some were taken to hospital with burns caused by leaking fuel and two suspected people traffickers have been arrested.

On Tuesday a Médecins sans Frontières boat saved 107 people from a dinghy off the Libyan coast but their operatives found the bodies of 29 people lying in a mixture of fuel and seawater on board. These poor souls had died from their burns, from suffocation or from drowning.

Calais is not the only place where there have been ugly scenes this week as residents of Goro [Ferrara] protested against the planned arrival at a hostel there of 12 migrants by setting up road blocks. [I should point out that many migrant hostels are overcrowded and short of resources in Italy.] As one of the women was pregnant, a decision was made to take the group elsewhere but Interior Minister Angelino Alfano was quick to point out that this incident is not representative of Italy. The country, he said, is characterised by the young people who go to the quayside at Lampedusa to help with new migrant arrivals or Dr Bartolo of Lampedusa [who works tirelessly for both the inhabitants of Lampedusa and the migrants who arrive there].

Prime Minister Renzi, meanwhile, has said that, though it is clear that Europe cannot open its doors to all, EU states that build walls to keep out migrants should expect no funding from Italy.  He said EU states should work together to solve the migration crisis rather than playing on hatred and intolerance.

Pope Francis, as usual, put it simply and succinctly but managed to show that he understands the reasons for hardening attitudes.  In St Peter's Square on Wednesday he said,

"Today, the context of economic crises unfortunately fosters the emergence of attitudes that are closed and unwelcoming. In some parts of the world, walls and barricades are being erected. Closure [of borders] is not a solution as it ends up encouraging trafficking. The only path towards a solution is that of solidarity.”

"EVERY MAN WHO IS A MAN"

On the third anniversary of this tragedy in the Mediterranean, at least 6,000 migrants have been saved by the Italian Coast Guard, Navy and ships belonging to international non-governmental organisations. The Coast Guard reports that there were 18 rescue operations involving 39 migrant boats. Sadly, nine bodies have also been recovered in the Sicilian Channel. On one dinghy a man was found dead and several migrants had burns and other wounds caused by leaking fuel. Two children and a woman with serious burns were rushed to hospital.

The surge of boats again heading for Italy from Libya is due to calmer weather conditions after a week or so of rough seas and no one expects them to stop coming. Laura Boldrini, the Speaker of the Italian Chamber of Deputies, again asked the rest of the EU to take their share of responsibility for migrants, reminding these countries that they do not hesitate to take their share of incoming EU resources.  It is with little optimism that I express my hope that her words will be heeded this time.

To mark this Day of Memory for Migrants, Rai 3 tonight showed the film Fuocoammare, directed by Gianfranco Rosi. I wrote about this film some months ago but had not seen it before tonight. The director spent 18 months on Lampedusa, filming a migrant boat trying to reach Italy, the rescue and recovery operation,  the processing of the migrants once they reach the island and the daily life of the islanders, including that of ER medic Dr Pietro Bartoli. Prior to tonight's screening, Gianfranco Rosi told Panorama magazine that on Lampedusa he found a much more complex and multi-layered story than he had expected . He said,

"It is not a political film but we cannot let the Mediterranean be the tomb of people fleeing war, hunger and desperation...  It is useless to erect barriers as walls have been toppled throughout history...  People fleeing desperation and death have no choice."

Fuocoammare is to be Italy's entry for Best Picture in the 2017 Oscars but its nomination has given rise to controversy. Paolo Sorrentino, director of La Grande Bellezza, has raised an objection not because he doubts the film's merits but because he believes it should be entered in the documentary section. Others do not think the film is sufficiently commercial. I have an opionion but will leave those of you who intend to see it  - and I hope many of you do - to make up your own minds.  I will say that I couldn't speak for at least half an hour after watching it and twitter revealed that many Italians felt the same. It is my belief that the film should be compulsory viewing for all would-be builders of border walls.

I  would also like to say that I am very proud of Italy tonight and will close with a quote from Dr Bartolo:

"È dovere di ogni uomo che sia un uomo aiutare queste persone - It is the duty of every man who is a man to help these people."

MUCH ADO TO BRING ABOUT NOTHING

As the UN focuses on migration this week, first at Monday's Summit on Large Movements of Refugees and Migrants and then during the General Debate of the 71st Session, one might have hoped for some collective action to offer a little hope to desperate people but I have to say, if I were a migrant seeking safety now, I would be more than disappointed.

Yesterday, while politicians measured their words and refugees continued to risk their lives on the high seas or to languish in camps, UNHCR announced that, as of that day, the number of migrants arriving on European shores since the beginning of 2016 had reached 300,000.  This is lower than the number of arrivals in the same period last year but more than in 2014.  Italy has seen virtually the same number of arrivals this year as last but more migrants are trying to stay in the country.

This is exactly what the Prime Minister of my own country wishes to see, for Mrs May made it quite clear, both in a speech on Monday and in her address to the General Assembly yesterday, that she believes that migrants should claim asylum in the first safe country they reach, which is, of course, EU law under the Dublin Regulation.  But if that country is already saving thousands of lives in the Mediterranean and is being stretched to its limits to deal with the number of arrivals [and is doing so humanely]? What then, Mrs May? Our new Prime Minister seems to have no answer.  When she said yesterday that the UK was "committed to helping countries adapt to refugees' needs", I did not get the impression that she meant Italy and Greece, which bear the main burden of arrivals, but receiving countries bordering Syria. 

Few people would disagree with Mrs May's  affirmation that countries have the right to control their own borders or with what seems a genuine commitment to eradicating people trafficking and one of its consequences, which she rightly calls "modern slavery".  However, her strategy for doing so takes for granted that we are dealing with non-chaotic countries of departure, which we are not. I have yet to hear Mrs May or any other top-ranking politician praise Italy for its work in bringing people traffickers to justice. [A total of 148 alleged people traffickers have been arrested in the Province of Ragusa alone in 2016.]

The British Premier gave contradictory messages, on the one hand saying that there is nothing wrong with moving to seek a better life but on the other hand stating that governments need to distinguish between economic migrants and refugees more clearly and find "a better way of dealing with economic migration".  She did not say how they would do this and her speech was hardly reassuring, even to migrants-by-choice like myself, for strangely, in the middle of her address to the GA, came this:

"We must all commit to the return of our own nationals when they have no right to remain elsewhere."

This was surely a Brexit reference and if it was, it was inappropriate.  If this one sentence can make a legal migrant-by-choice uneasy, what impact would her other words have on someone desperately hoping to be granted asylum?

Meanwhile Mr Renzi, also on Monday, received the Global Citizen Award of the Atlantic Council from Mr Kerry and said,

"Italy saves lives in the Mediterranean becaue we can afford to lose some votes but we cannot afford to lose our humanity."

He also announced that Italy's humanitarian aid budget is to be increased by 30% and, with refreshing honesty, told journalists [outside the meeting] that there is no political will to solve the refugee crisis because the leaders of France and Germany have elections coming up and he himself could be swept away by the outcome of Italy's imminent referendum on constitutional reform. Nailed it, Mr Renzi!  

While the  politicians were arriving comfortably in their armoured cars, migrants were continuing to attempt the perilous Mediterranean journey in woefully overcrowded dinghies or even less seaworthy vessels. Here are just a few of the migration developments which have occurred while our politicians have been preparing or giving their speeches at the UN:

La Repubblica reported today that 128,479 migrants were saved in the Sicilian Channel between 1st January and 15th September and 958 of the boats which had been carrying them had come from Libya.  

At the weekend a 15-year-old became the youngest refugee to be killed trying to enter the UK illegally from Calais and on 6th September the body of a young male migrant who had entered France from Ventimiglia [where the French have closed the border] was found under a flyover on the French side.  No one knows what happened. 

This afternoon a  migrant boat sank off Rosetta in Egypt and so far 42 people are reported to have died. The Egyptian authorites have saved 155 people but no one knows how many were on board.

Need I go on?

There are, however, three positive outcomes from the UN sessions:  one is the summit held by President Obama at the UN yesterday, at which significant promises were made; another is that the International Organisation for Migration [IOM]  became, on Monday, formally linked to the UN as a "related organisation." This is important because it gives the UN a migration mandate. The third development is a promise to set in motion a Global Compact on safe migration upholding human rights. Let us hope that this is implemented soon.  Are we to see action or was it all much ado to bring about nothing?

You can read the full text of British Prime Minister Theresa May's address to the General Assembly of the UN here.

You can read the text of President Obama's speech at the 20th September Summit here.

Update: 22.9.16 at 14.41:

The latest estimate regarding the migrant boat which sank off Rosetta yesterday is that up to 600 people may have been on board. 163 migrants have now been rescued and 43 bodies have been recovered. The boat is now known to have been heading for Italy.

A VIEW FROM ITALY

On this portentous night when, to quote the newspaper La Sicilia, "the fate of Europe depends on the mood of the British", how is it all being viewed here?  With incredulity, puzzlement, dismay and a little grudging admiration, it seems to me.

To understand the first two reactions, you have to understand that in most EU countries the organisation is still seen, notwithstanding its faults, as the best guarantee we have of peace in the region.  This is a view to which I subscribe, for you cannot spend most of your life studying and teaching French and Italian without being influenced by the literature those countries produced during the Second World War and its aftermath, nor can you ignore the ideals of Jean Monnet.

Dismay enters the picture because most people here think that if Britain leaves the EU, it will signal the beginning of the end, with Italy, a country which has suffered greatly during the recent recession, exploring the "out" option next. It has to be said that many people I have spoken to would not consider this a bad idea.

I am, as you will have gathered, culturally and emotionally European and this would be the case whether I still lived in the UK or not. However, as an expat Brit living in the EU, I have other concerns about a Brexit, for the jury is still out on whether or not the "acquired rights" of British citizens who have settled in EU countries would be affected.  I have read two contradictory articles about this in two days and have concluded that actually, no one has a clue.  Italians and other EU citizens who have settled in Britain
have similar worries.

Yes, it is unlikely that Italy would deport all the Brits and that the UK would deport all the Italians  - what would happen to the UK restaurant trade?!  There would probably be an agreement between the two countries and indeed, I have a feeling that there already is one, which pre-dates Britain's membership of the EU. However, a country like Italy, never happier than when it is inventing new bureaucracy that in the end even its authors do not understand, would surely create new legal hurdles for expat Brits to jump. As I have often had to deal, here, with officialdom that thinks that because Britain is not in the eurozone it has never been in the EU, I am not hopeful that the average Italian town hall clerk would be familiar with the terms of any international agreement on my status.

My impressions of this referendum campaign and of my countrymen during it come mostly from the media and obviously, I am viewing the situation from afar but tonight I want to make a plea: Both sides have, in recent weeks and for different reasons, used the slogan, "I want my country back." Well, I want my country back too and, before I get shouted down, in some quarters, because I "don't even live in the UK", I would point out that I pay taxes there and still have UK voting rights. and of course I care what happens to the country that made me.  

I want my country back because I want the fun of being British back: what happened, during this campaign, to our healthy scepticism about almost everything, to our understatement, to our sense of irony and our ability to find humour, but not at the expense of those unable to take it, in all but the bleakest of situations?  What happened to our ability to laugh at ourselves [a characteristic we share with the Italians]? I also want  to be able to say that in my country racist posters are illegal, that we can have a disagreement without name-calling or yelling untruths at one another and that politicians are not gunned down in the street for their beliefs.  I want to say that I come from a nation that cares about the fate of those less fortunate than its own citizens, that takes pride in diversity and that is, above all, tolerant.

Whatever happens later on tonight and in the early hours of tomorrow morning, I want my gentle, self-deprecating, tolerant country back.

De toutes les superstitions, la plus dangereuse, n'est-ce pas celle de haïr son prochain pour ses opinions? 

Di tutte le superstizioni, la più pericolosa non è quella di odiare il prossimo per le sue opinioni? 

Of all superstitions, is not the most dangerous that of hating your neighbour for his opinions?

Voltaire - Traité sur la Tolérance / Trattato sulla tolleranza /  Treatise on Tolerance, 1763

SUMMER TIDES, 2016 - 3

Almost unbelieveably, tonight I find myself writing about the third migrant boat tragedy to have occurred within three days and I am wondering, not for the first time, how many people have to die in this way before politicians the world over show the shame they ought to be feeling.

Earlier today an Italian naval vessel went to the aid of a migrant  boat which had half sunk 35 miles off the coast of Libya. The Navy and other vessels called in to help managed to save 135 migrants, some of whom were children but ten bodies were found at the bottom of the boat.  Altogether 45 bodies have been recovered so far but dozens more may have drowned.

La Repubblica reports that at least 200 people have died in the three disasters of the last three days and that 15,000 have been saved at sea over the last five days. Of these 2,000 were saved today alone in operations led by the Italian Navy and Coast Guard.

The following is an extract from the G7 Leaders' Declaration of 26th - 27th May:

"The G7 recognizes the ongoing large scale movements of migrants and refugees as a global challenge which requires a global response. We commit to increase global assistance to meet immediate and long-term needs of refugees and other displaced persons as well as their host communities. The G7 encourages international financial institutions and bilateral donors to bolster their financial and technical assistance."

So, Mr President, Mme Chancellor, Messrs Prime Minister, Messrs President of the Council and Commission President: which one of you is going to start?

RIDDLE OF THE WEEK

When is an installment not an installment? When Rai [Italy's public service broadcasting company, owned by the Ministry of Economy and Finance] has anything to do with it, that's when!

For some time now, Italy has been trying to solve the problem of TV licence fee evaders, of which there are many.  A couple of years ago, it was decided that, if the fee was added to electricity bills, everyone would have to pay it on time, for everyone has electricity and if you have electricity you are bound to have a TV, right?  Who, after all, could live without one? Well, quite a few people are actually claiming that they can and do.

If you genuinely don't have a TV and therefore wish to be exempted from licence fee payment, you are going to have to prove it, this year and every year, and, quite honestly, I don't fancy your chances. I have a friend here who has never had a TV and who has to date fought a ten-year battle in order to be believed - a fiasco which began long before some bureaucrat came up with the combined licence fee and electricity bill idea.

But let us get to the installments: as a softener, the licence fee has been slightly reduced from €113,50 to €100 per year, to be paid in ten installments.  Parliament finally passed the measure last year after much to-ing amd fro-ing and if you're British, like me, you might have expected to be billed for the first installment with the first electricity bill of 2016. This didn't happen and nobody seemed to know if or when the payments would have to start. Now, however, it has been announced that the first "installment" will be requested with the July electricity bill - only it won't be one installment, but six, as the January - June installments will have to be paid in one go.  To my mind, this renders them non-installments but a down payment, though everybody else just sighs and regards the situation as perfectly normal - which of course, it is in Italy, a country not known for its ability to simplify such matters.

Something tells me there is going to be a fair amount of chaos in July!

SICILY SCENE REVISITED - MIGRATION

In tonight's look back at Sicily Scene over the last ten years, which focuses on migration, I was going to say that I hoped I would never have to write about incidents like this and this again.  Yet, exactly one year after the "Hecatomb" tragedy, it is probable that another large-scale migrant disaster has occurred in the Mediterranean.

I say "probable" because there are conflicting reports over exactly what has happened and the numbers involved but what I can glean is this:  Three days ago four inadequate boats carrying up to 500 migrants from Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia left Egypt for Italy and there has been no definite news of them since so they are believed to have capsized.  Relatives of some of the passengers have called Don Mussie Zerai of Habeshia because they had received calls from their loved ones aboard asking for help but there was no response when they tried to call them back. Then the BBC Arabic Service reported 400 passengers missing and 30 survivors but other news services are reporting 200 dead.  A man claiming to be a survivor said that 500 people were lost and that he was one of only 23 who survived.  UNHCR earlier put the number of survivors at 40.  UNHCR, the Italian Government, Médecins Sans Frontières and the Italian Coast Guard are all awaiting further information as I write. 

This comes two days after Pope Francis shamed Europe's leaders by actually doing something to help desperate people and three days after Italy's Premier Renzi presented his country's "Migration Compact" plan to the EU Commission and Council.  It has been generally welcomed.  The Compact proposes much closer cooperation with migrants' countries of origin and with transit countries, backed up by the use of dedicated funds which could come from Eurobonds [though the German government does not like this idea, preferring to tax petrol to raise the money]. Under the plan member states would commit themselves to actively helping with border control, reducing migration flows and with repatriation and readmission of migrants.  In addition, they would step up the fight against human trafficking.  Premier Renzi has also expressed his displeasure at the Austrian plan to erect a barrier at the Brenner Pass, a thoroughfare which Italy regards as essential for its trade.

With the closure of the Greek-Balkan migrant route, Italy is again preparing itself for a migrant influx, particularly as summer fast approaches.  Up to 6,000 migrants used the Libya-Italy route last week and 10,000 are estimated to have entered the country in March.  Italy continues to save lives in the Mediterranean and to treat migrant arrivals with a humanity sadly lacking in other parts of Europe.

Migration has been a subject close to my heart for the past ten years and my first post on a migration tragedy was this one , from 2006. It is short but illustrates the fact that no one was taking notice then. Since that time the world has been forced to acknowledge the crisis but not in the way I would have hoped: I have always been pro-EU and am entitled to vote in the forthcoming referendum on Britain's continuing membership. I shall vote "in" but, given that 28 countries, some of which are among the richest in the world, can find neither the political will nor the compassion to work together on this humanitarian crisis, even I have to ask what this organisation is for.

I know how it feels to leave your country and it is difficult even when you choose to do so, love the new one and have been fortunate enough to take with you the people and things that give you solace. No one displaces himself, leaving everything behind, without a valid reason.

A reminder that you can find links to all my migration posts here.