“We hold this conference a few days after one of the many, too many, tragedies at sea, in the Mediterranean, between Libya and Italy. The NGO Open Arms, the only one that with the Italian Coast Guard every day rescues people in that stretch of the sea, showed us the images of a mother, exhausted on an inflatable dinghy, screaming, begging rescuers to look for her child lost at sea. That child was 6 months old, his name was Joseph, he came from Guinea and died shortly after being taken aboard the Open Arms vessel, waiting for help that unfortunately arrived too late”. European Parliament President David Sassoli opened the Inter-parliamentary Conference on Migration and Asylum in Europe today. “I want to talk about this child – he said – because behind the numbers discussed, rightly so, in the analysis of migratory flows, there are people and there are stories. People and stories that must be the heart of any effective migration and asylum policy”. “I believe that the new political cycle today gives us the historic opportunity to make this qualitative leap: to carry out effective and humane policies. And I want to welcome the European Commission’s proposal for a Migration and Asylum Pact, a package of legislative proposals that represents a first basis for work”.