Miguel Duarte is a sea rescuer in the Central Mediterranean. He has been active in the migrants’ rights movement since 2016. In 2018 he was indicted for aiding and abetting illegal immigration in Italy, a crime that could lead to up to 20 years in prison, as part of the first of many criminalization cases against humanitarian workers in the Mediterranean. Miguel was acquitted in 2021 and went back to the sea with the German NGO Sea-Watch. In Portugal, where he lives, he works as a theoretical physicist and is part of HuBB – Humans Before Borders, a platform for the protection of migrants’ rights.
