The Deadly EU Border Control Xavier Ferrer-Gallardo 1 Departament de Geografia, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona Xavier.ferrer.gallardo@uab.cat Henk van Houtum Nijmegen Centre for Border Research, Radboud University Nijmegen and University of Bergamo h.vanhoutum@fm.ru.nl Let’s start with three recent maritime lethal incidents at the gates of the European Union. 1. On 29 March 2012, the Dutch Senator and law scholar Tineke Strik presented the report entitled Lives lost in the Mediterranean: Who is responsible? 2 on behalf of the Council of Europe. The document reported about what could be labeled a conscious non-rescue of a boat with migrants that had left Tripoli one year before, on 26 March 2011, for the Italian island of Lampedusa. Seventy-two refugees travelled in the boat. After two weeks adrift, the waves returned the boat to the coast of Libya with only 11 survivors on board. Two of them died in the following days. 1 Published under Creative Commons licence: Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2 “Lives lost in the Mediterranean Sea: who is responsible?” Report. Committee on Migration, Refugees and Displaced Persons. Rapporteur: Ms Tineke STRIK, Netherlands, Socialist Group http://assembly.coe.int/CommitteeDocs/2012/20120329_mig_RPT.EN.pdf (accessed 11/04/2012)