This, I believe, is the key. The tragedy of the Adriana is a difficult burden to bear when our thoughts, words and actions have zero impact on the policy makers. That so many died makes that more difficult.

Our European leaders are more cruel than the sea. Their pensions are worth more than human lives. They even legislate to make compassion a crime. They have seared their consciences and treat the UN with contempt.

Western Europe and its American overlord have the worst record in history for cruelty and savagery, so much so that we shouldn't be surprised that the lives of refugees and asylum seekers are treated with such disregard.

We need a new order where the world has true leaders, not corporate puppets and political psychopaths, where right is not wrong and wrong is not right.

Vijay Prashad says the UN is a very flawed institution but the UN Charter is the greatest consensual document in the world. The collective West pays lip service to that charter. Our policy makers are hypocrites who continually flout their own obligations with impunity. Cram them in a rusty boat and see how the get on.