There is no point in telling them not to come, he said.

The struggles of adjusting to an unfamiliar land pale in comparison with the threat of death or persecution in places like Afghanistan, Syria or Eritrea, which has an isolated and repressive government.

Despite the dangers, the high walls, the barbed wire or other obstacles thrown in their paths, the migrants keep trying to reach Europe, lured by even the slimmest prospect of a new start.

“At least here we are not slaves and have a little hope for the future,” said Fanus Agby, 19, another survivor with Mr. Haile who made it to Sweden, where she hopes to become a nurse.

Of the 155 migrants who survived the Lampedusa shipwreck, around 100 made it to Sweden. Because they first arrived in Italy, under European Union rules, they should have been fingerprinted and had their requests for asylum taken there. And they should have remained there while their applications were being processed.

The failure of governments, wary of an anti-immigrant backlash as right-wing parties gain support, to follow these rules has now moved to the center of disputes between European leaders over how to handle the migration crisis.

Migrants themselves have also undermined the rules. Ms. Agby, the 19-year-old Lampedusa shipwreck survivor who made it to Sweden, said she had been so desperate to avoid being forced to stay in Italy that she had burned a plastic bag and rubbed her fingers in the molten goo to make her fingerprints unreadable.

Only one survivor of the October crossing, a young man who asked to be identified only by his first name, Tadese, got stuck in Italy, where his fingerprints were taken after he was hospitalized because of his injuries. The 50 or so other survivors mostly ended up in Norway, Germany and Denmark.