A confidential draft summit statement seen by the Guardian states that only 5,000 resettlement places across Europe are to be offered to refugees under the emergency summit crisis package to be agreed by EU leaders in Brussels on Thursday. The draft statement says that the vast majority of those who survive the journey will be sent back as irregular migrants under a new rapid-return scheme co-ordinated by the EU’s border agency, Frontex.

This will mean that the grueling journey will be to no avail for those captured. 150,000 migrants managed to make the journey to Italy alone last year, whereas 36,000 boat survivors reached Italy, Malta and Greece in 2015 alone.

EU leaders are likely to agree to immediate action to “undertake systematic efforts to identify, capture and destroy vessels before they are used by traffickers.”

The crisis, according to the draft statement is viewed as a tragedy. “Our immediate priority is to prevent more people dying at sea. We have therefore decided to strengthen our presence at sea, to fight the traffickers, to prevent illegal migration flows and to reinforce internal solidarity.”