On Tuesday 27 November, and on the occasion of a meeting of the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs meeting, associating representatives of other European institutions as well as of international organisations such as the UNHCR, the International Maritime Organization (IMO), the International Organisation of Migrations (IOM) and the Search and Rescue Observatory for the Mediterranean (SAROBMED), the conditions under which rescue operations are conducted by Libyan coast guards were discussed. The operations conducted by the latter are controversial and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Raad al Hussein, declared that the EU’s policy of assisting the Libyan Coast Guard to intercept and return migrants is “an outrage to conscience of humanity”. Members of the European Parliament tried to get clarification from the IMO and the newly created Search and Rescue Observatory for the Mediterranean (SAROBMED) about Libya being assigned a Search and Rescue area in the Mediterranean, which implies that vessels carrying migrants and refugees could be ordered to disembark in Libya. Also, the Parliament’s Legal Service gave a presentation focusing on the concept of disembarkation platforms and controlled centres, proposed by the European Council on June, as an externalised instrument to control EU borders and to “improve the processing of migrants and refugee flows into the EU”.