Cardinal Gualtiero Bassetti,
the president of Italian bishops conference CEI, said Thursday
that those helping migrants must stick strictly to the law to
ensure they are not seen as being accomplices of human
traffickers.
"I reiterate the clearest rejection of any form of modern
slavery in the face of the aberrant plague of human
trafficking," Bassetti said.
"But I also lay claim with equal vigor to the need for an
ethic of responsibility and respect of the law.
"Precisely to defend the interests of the weakest, we cannot
run the risk - not even for pure idealism that dramatically
transforms into naiveness - of giving the pretext of
collaborating with the traffickers of human meat, even if this
is false".
Some politicians have criticised the work of NGOs involved in
migrant rescues in the Mediterranean, saying they are
encouraging traffickers.
Sicilian prosecutors recently seized a ship run by a German
NGO in a probe over alleged aiding of illegal immigration.
The NGO in question refused to sign a code of conduct at the
interior ministry for organizations involved in rescues.
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