Source: www.salon.com - Thursday, April 28, 2016 Five years after bombing Libya and effectively destroying its government, NATO has declared plans to impose a naval blockade on the North African nation in order to prevent refugees and migrants from entering Europe. Human rights experts say this plan likely violates international law, like the E.U. plan to deport refugees and migrants en masse to Turkey. The U.S. expressed support for the proposed NATO blockade this week. “[Obama] said he was willing to commit NATO assets,” Italian Prime Minster Matteo Renzi told reporters. After a meeting of the heads of state of the U.S., U.K., France, Germany and Italy, the White House released a statement saying the Western leaders urged NATO and the E.U. “to draw on their experience in the Aegean to explore how they could work together to address in an orderly and humane way migrant flows in the central Mediterranean.” NATO is already patrolling the Aegean Sea between Greece and Turkey for refugees and migrants fleeing violence in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. “Through the NATO mission in the Aegean Sea, the U.S. has shown its willingness to take part in combating illegal immigration here,” said German Chancellor Angela Merkel, characterizing mass refugee movement as “illegal immigration.” According to Merkel, President Obama assured European leaders the U.S. is “prepared to also take responsibility with regard to the migration route from Libya to Italy if necessary.” An estimated All Related
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