We dedicate this slogan to the daily struggles of people, who in North-Africa are called Harraga - "border-burners" - while crossing the border without visa and burning their ID-documents afterwards not to be deported.


Maldusa is a cultural association aimed at facilitating freedom of movement, supporting existing infrastructures for migrant solidarity, as well as researching and documenting border violence, on land and at sea, on the Mediterranean routes.

Lampedusa has historically been narrated and understood merely as a border zone, with a binary representation between island of peace and island of violence. The spectacularization of crisis and emergency has oftenled to a lack of understanding of the local, continuous, daily struggles of people who inhabit and cross the island...

In Palermo, the Maldusa cultural association seeks to bridge a multitude of local and transnational realities that derive from anti-racist struggles, migrant activism and solidarity, as well as building bridges between communities on the move and their places of departure...

The Mediterranean Sea is a contested space, inhabited by a variety of actors who struggle for and against freedom of movement. Every day, people who cross the sea, authorities who surveil and abandon them, NGOs who search and rescue, fishermen and merchant vessels crews, either attempt to defy borders or, willingly or not, reinforce them...

BUILDING BRIDGES, BURNING BORDERS - MALDUSA ONE YEAR BOOKLET
'BURNING BORDERS'
We dedicate this slogan to the daily struggles of people, who in North-Africa are called Harraga - "border-burners" - while crossing the border without visa and burning their ID-documents afterwards not to be deported.
In this booklet we narrate the first year of Maldusa, its vision and its projects.
With one station in Lampedusa, a second station in Palermo, a boat at sea and dozens of informarmal and formal relationships with solidarity infrastructures and people on the move, we created solid platforms for monitoring and reporting border violence, as well as for supporting and facilitating freedom of movement.
NEWS and PUBLICATIONS
An impressive "Zuwara Fleet"
While the numbers of people on the move from Tunisia arriving in Italy drastically decreased since End of September 2023, an increasing traffic can be observed from western Libya, including the phenomenon of crowded big fishing vessels
Interview on movements of Tunisians
October Maldusa Camp
Maldusa had invited about 60 activists from various solidarity projects in the Mediterranean Sea and beyond. On the one hand, the network internal meeting intended to further consolidate cooperation and practices between actors at sea and on land that has been developing in recent years. On the other hand, several public events and a commemorative...
Dying as a result of a transhipment at sea
Snapshots from Lampedusa
the return of the iron boats, the arrivals from Libya, the impasse after the end of PASSIM3 and the responsibilities of the authorities in transhipments at sea
[In October 2023 most of arrivals in Lampedusa were on wooden boats departed from Libya with most of people declaring Eritrean, Sudanese and Egyptian nationalities. Already in September, along with arrivals from Tunisia in iron boats (non-Tunisian people) and wooden boats (mainly Tunisian people), arrivals from Libya had increased despite pullback...
FRIENDS

CIVIL MRCC
The Civil Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (CMRCC) is a coordination and documentation platform for people in distress in the Central Mediterranean Sea.

Ragazzi Baye Fall
Since 6 years in Palermo, a self-organised solidarity group of the Baye Fall diaspora.

Welcome to Europe
For freedom of movement: Independent information for refugees and migrants going to Europe.

Borderline Europe
Civil resistance against the European migration and border policy since 2007

Mem.Med
Searching and identifying missing migrants at the Mediterranean border.

Louise Michel
Solidarity and Resistance at Sea - combining lifeguarding with the principles of feminism, anti-racism and anti-fascism.

In Limine / ASGI
Addressing issues relating to borders control and access to international protection.