It will involve searching ships in the Mediterranean carrying arms off Libya and checking on illegal fuel and oil being smuggled from the war-torn North African country.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell says diplomacy cannot work without enforcement action. 

Europe will use its aerial, satellite and maritime assets to ensure the UN arms embargo against Libya is enforced.

A previous attempt to do this was blocked by the then Italian government claiming the use of warships attracted illegal immigrants to its shores.

The EU announcement came as rebels loyal to Khalifa Haftar shelled Tripoli days after agreeing to ceasefire with the Government of National Accord to allow medics to deal with the COVID 19 pandemic  

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22 women were rescued but a dozen are still missing.

More than 1000 people have died this year trying to cross the Mediterranean from Africa to Europe.

In the Tunisian city of Tatatouine last week, I spoke to would-be migrants wait to meet people smugglers in a coffee bar.

I asked them why they are willing to put their lives and life savings in the hands of people who charge tens of thousands of rands to cram people into unseaworthy vessels.

A young man responded that living without a job and prospects was worse than death 

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The polling is a week ahead of the second round of the presidential contest that will determine the future of the only democracy to have emerged from the Arab Spring eight years ago.

Analysts are paying particular attention to the turnout in today’s poll.

Fewer than half of the seven million Tunisian voters cast their ballots in the first round of the Presidential election last month.

This indicated the disillusionment with current political reality as much as the choice of two outsiders to contest the run-off.

Many young Tunisians are staying away, believing the politicians don’t have an answer for the economic stagnation hamstringing their Mediterranean Arab country.

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He was speaking at the United Nations General Assembly in New York as the first of migrants started arriving in Rwanda.

Rwanda’s taking in the migrants as part of a deal with the African Union and the United Nations High Commission for Refugees.

Most of them are from the Horn of Africa.

Libya reached a deal with the European Union to keep the migrants from crossing the Mediterranean into their territory.

President Paul Kagame insists his efforts to end the migrants’ misery in Libya does not involve him  taking any money from the EU 

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The wind picks up on the sea these late summer evenings, whipping up the waves. If one hopes  to navigate the Mediterranean with any safety in a small boat, it had best be before winter turns the water colder and rougher.

So this is a crucial time for those fleeing conflict and persecution back home – or simply wishing to feed a family – by crossing the Mediterranean and finding shelter in Europe.

Indeed it is crunch time for refugees everywhere as the spotlight is turned on them by the United Nations General Assembly starting in New York.

The bigoted Matteo Salvini , who aligned himself with United States President Donald Trump in making cruelty a policy for deterring migrants, has disappeared for now as Italy’s Interior Minister. 

The full effect of this has yet to be revealed.

But for now captains of rescue ships do not risk imprisonment by taking aboard those cynically thrown to their fate by people smugglers. 

Some relief then for those taking this route to Europe. Their numbers have dramatically diminished:About a tenth of the number crossing  three year ago. But the Mediterranean  claims proportionately more of their lives.

Thanks to the efforts of the United Nations High Commission on Refugees, fewer of them will be taken to Libya where they face detention in appalling conditions or worse.

The country rendered ungovernable after the fall of Muammar Gadaffi is no longer an easy option for European countries trying to reduce the migrant wave.

This does not mean European countries will take appreciably more people from Africa and the Middle East.

No more than the United States will welcome those from Central and South American countries seeking safer, better lives.

Indeed, South Africa will not be able to take in all those Africans coming  across the Limpopo and the Kruger National Park.

One must hope an international understanding can be reached that there is a universal responsibility to provide a refuge.

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500 of them, mostly from the Horn of Africa, will be flown in Uganda in coming weeks.

Rwanda first offered to take migrants from Libya when television footage nearly two years ago showed some of them being sold off as slaves.

The United Nations High Commission for Refugees says nearly 5000 people are living in parlous conditions in Libyan detention camps.

It’s appealed to navies saving migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean to Europe not to send them to Libya.

The migrants being taken by Rwanda include many children and women in vulnerable positions.

The Rwandan government insists its not being paid for taking in these refugees.

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Economic and security problems have dogged the Mediterranean country squeezed between Algeria and Libya .

The Niba Tounes coalition of the late President Beji Caid Essebsi, whose death in July forced the election earlier than planned, has effectively disintegrated.

So the only relatively safe bet in this field of 26 candidates is that no-one will  emerge as an outright winner.

This will necessitate a second round between the two frontrunners by early November.

That will be after parliamentary elections that will shape the future of country that historically punches above its weight  in the African, Arab and Mediterranean worlds. 

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This despite a decree from outgoing Interior Minister Matteo Salvini barring the Eleonore from Italian waters.

The rescue ship had been stranded at sea for more than a week, putting the migrants at risk.

It is not clear what will happen to them once they have disembarked at Sicily or indeed what the police will do with the ship.

The action comes as anti-immigrant right winger Matteo Salvini prepares to leave office as Interior Minister having lost his job by overplayed his hand in  a domestic power push that has left him in position that many braving the hazardous Mediterranean crossing  might envy: high and dry.

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The Parliamentary speaker from the North African country, Mohammed  Ennaceur, has been sworn in as interim president until elections in October.

Bejii Caid Essebsi is Tunisia’s first democratically-elected president.

He became Prime Minister after Beni Ali was deposed in the Arab Spring of 2011.

Three years later, Essebsi was elected President.

He opened the political space but was unable to bring the property he promised because of sporadic terrorist attacks by Islamist fundamentalist groups that crippled the tourism industry which is the biggest foreign currency earner for the picturesque country nestled between  Libya and Algeria with views of Europe across the Mediterranean.

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UN envoy Ghassan Salame says the attack that wounded more than 80 people could constitute a war crime.

Britain moved to condemn the air strike blamed on warlord Khalifa Haftar’s self styled Libyan National Army who have threatened to increase air strikes on the capital Tripoli.

But the United States requires approval from Washington before being able to sign the declaration.

United Nations High Commission for Refugees spokesman Charlie Yaxley calls for immediate action.

“We have to see a change now. There has to be an immediate release from all the refugees detained in these centres in Libya and we have to make sure that no rescued refugee, rescued from the central Mediterranean, is taken back to Libya,” he says

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres is outraged at the attack and calls for an independent investigation to ensure the perpetrators are brought to justice

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