Unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown: zonation strategy, search and rescue, and a legacy of death and refoulement in the central Mediterranean

Abstract

This study examines the EU’s exercise of maritime security in the Central Mediterranean, within the context of boat migration along this migration route. The focus of the study is upon the role of maritime zones in maritime security implementation and evolution of associated practices. Zonation strategy is coined herein, to characterise the manipulation of maritime zones to align with security and political agendas. The interplay between international establishments of law and norms, the deployment of large-scale naval operations, the role and accounting of third-party actors in this maritime security context, and the operationalisation of surveillance tools, uncovers the utilisation of zonal regimes to enforce migration controls in the middle of the Central Mediterranean. The EU’s zonation strategy is thus observed through the creation of a search and rescue (SAR) frontier – theorised as fluid migratory border enforcement space, spanning parts of the seas on either side of the meeting point of EU and Libyan SAR zones. This SAR frontier is addressed and evidenced through the practices that construct and enforce it, as an invisible space that separates Libyan and EU assignment of responsibilities. Indeed, emphasis is placed on how the EU empowers and facilitates Libyan Coast Guard interdiction of boat migrant vessels, and the subsequent return (refoulement) of these vulnerable persons, back to Libya.

It is argued that the SAR frontier, and EU zonation strategy more broadly, reflects an exclusionary and necropolitical dimension, whereby the manipulation of maritime zones facilitates targeted exclusion of boat migrants at any cost – refoulement or death. The loss of life on the Central Mediterranean is well documented, and is situated in this study amidst the withdrawal of EU naval SAR vessels, and the criminalisation of NGO SAR operations, leaving a SAR and humanitarian void in the Central Mediterranean. This zonation strategy approach therefore challenges the prevailing narratives of maritime security scholarship that depict maritime security agendas as forces for good sea order, and emphasises the human consequences of EU maritime security and zonation strategy. This research subsequently contributes to scholarship associated with migration studies, border studies, and security studies, and provides a new framework for future maritime security research.

Thesis is embargoed until 31st December 2027.

Date of Award	Dec 2025
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Queen's University Belfast
Sponsors	The Northern Ireland and North East Doctoral Training Partnership
Supervisor	Alister Miskimmon (Supervisor), Heather Johnson (Supervisor) & Michael Bourne (Supervisor)