Mercy’s role against human smuggling

When a criminal transporter of migrants confesses and asks for forgiveness, it opens a new solution for global migration.

The Monitor's View

A courtroom exchange on Tuesday in the West African nation of Senegal drew out what may be a key to resolving one of the most pernicious aspects of mass migration. Under vigorous questioning from the judge, a defendant acknowledged his role in transporting people illegally. Then he asked for “everyone’s forgiveness.”

The scale of human smuggling around the world is hard to quantify. The global population of migrants nears 300 million, according to the United Nations. Much of that movement crosses the Mediterranean Sea. At one point, as many as 90% of people reaching Europe irregularly from Africa moved through criminal networks, generating billions of dollars in illicit commerce. 

Europe has tried a range of strategies to curb the flow. In its latest move, the European Union launched a new network Wednesday to coordinate efforts among its 27 member states to counter drug trafficking, money laundering, and people smuggling.

The last issue has become a focal point of cooperation among governments in North Africa. The region is a key point of departure for people fleeing poverty, conflict, and the effects of climate change. So far this year, the U.N. reports, roughly 47,000 people have reached Italy alone by sea.

In Senegal, a succession of tragedies off the coast involving capsized vessels overcrowded with migrants has prompted a new government to crack down on criminal operations. Arrests have soared, resulting in the prosecution of 210 smugglers so far this year, Le Monde reported.

For countries on the receiving end of mass migration, addressing the root causes for why people leave their homes may be out of reach. Tunisia, for example, has little ability to shape events in Sudan or the Democratic Republic of Congo, where wars are displacing millions.

In South Africa, the police force in Johannesburg has found that compassion is an essential tool in countering migrant smuggling. A “victim-centered approach” that involves society in caring for targets of such crimes, “builds a relationship of trust that would be critical ... in the investigation meant to bring the criminals to justice,” a U.N. report observed last year.

The trial in Senegal’s seaside port of Mbour may have given that approach a new dimension. When the defendant Cheikh Sow sought forgiveness based on contrition, he evoked a distinctly African concept of justice rooted in redemption.

“A remorseful apology can contribute to a vocabulary of forgiveness in the context of evil,” wrote Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, a psychology professor at Stellenbosch University in South Africa. Her research on post-apartheid healing underscores the enabling effect of empathy. “Genuine remorse humanizes perpetrators and transforms their evil from the unforgivable into something that can be forgiven.”

Mr. Sow’s case has yet to be decided. Yet his remorse may encourage a view of justice in Senegal that finds a solution to migration and the criminality that exploits it in the recognition and restoration of individual integrity.