PD delegation board Sea-Watch ship

(ANSA) - Siracusa, January 28 - A delegation from the centre-left opposition Democratic Party (PD) on Monday boarded the NGO migrant rescue ship Sea-Watch 3, which is at the centre of a tussle between the government, opposition parties, and human rights groups. The president of the PD, Matteo Orfini, said that he and fellow party bigwig Maurizio Martina had been placed under investigation after visiting the migrant rescue ship in the Mediterranean.
    "The camps in Libya are an inferno that never ends, migrants told us on the #SeaWatch," Orfini wrote on Twitter. "I and @maumartina have just returned. "Now we are registering our official addresses because it seems we have been placed under investigation for boarding the ship." PD MP Davide Faraone, who accompanied the two party heavyweights, said earlier that the PD delegation had got the all-clear to board the ship and see for themselves the condition of the 47 rescued asylum seekers on board.
    "Meeting at the prefect's office over," Sicilian lawmaker Faraone said via Twitter.
    "A delegation of @pdnetwork will climb aboard the #SeaWatch around 15:30. Finally!!. The government has refused to let the migrants rescued in the Mediterranean over a week ago to land on Italian soil, as part of a policy of refusing access to Italy's ports to NGO-run search-and-rescue ships.
    Deputy Premier and Interior Minister Matteo Salvini has said the Netherlands should deal with the case as the Sea-Watch ship is flying a Dutch flag. Toilets aboard the ship are backed up and will soon be out of use, sources said Monday.
    The toilets used by the 22 NGO staffers and 47 migrants aboard are "close to saturation point", the sources said.
    The ship cannot discharge human waste in the sea because it is too close to land.
    On Sunday a mixed group of lawmakers from other opposition parties visited the ship, which is anchored in waters close to the Sicilian city of Siracusa. Earlier on Monday the Siracusa Port Authority issued a ban on any unauthorized vessel from "navigating, anchoring, or stopping" in the Bay of Santa Panagia, a half-mile from where the ship is. The ordinance specified that the "presence of and/or navigation by other vessels around the (Sea-Watch vessel) could create problems regarding public order and public health".
    Carla Trombino, the ombudsman for children in the Sicilian city of Siracusa, has filed an urgent petition to a Catania court for 13 minors on board the Sea-Watch migrant-rescue ship to be assigned to a specialist centre, sources said Monday. The petition was presented by a lawyer, Rosa Emanuela Lo Faro, on the grounds that the minors suffered "mistreatment and torture" in Libya. The lawyer also called for the maritime authorities to declare a medical emergency for the situation of the minors.