Italian government calls for migrant processing centres in North Africa

Italy is closing ports to refugee ships

Jon Stone
Brussels
Monday 25 June 2018 19:13 BST
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Authorities watch over a boat containing refugees as it attempts to port in Sicily
Authorities watch over a boat containing refugees as it attempts to port in Sicily

Italy’s new far-right interior minister has suggested setting up migrant processing centres in North Africa with the aim of regulating the number of people travelling to Europe.

Matteo Salvini on Monday visited Libya after telling “voracious” foreign non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to leave search and operations to Libya’s coastguard.

Mr Salvini met Libyan interior minister Abdulsalam Ashour and deputy prime minister Ahmed Maiteeq in Tripoli for talks about the refugee crisis.

“Reception and identification centres should be set up in the south of Libya,” he told reporters after the meeting, suggesting there could be a way of processing EU asylum applications outside the bloc’s territory.

The proposal is expected to be considered by the European Council at a summit later this week, following emergency talks between countries on Sunday.

The plan, for which Mr Salvini has not provided details, comes after the Italian minister told charities not to rescue migrants in distress in the Mediterranean sea, as part of country’s new hard-line policy against refugees. Various groups have in recent years organised boats to fill gaps in coastguard provision and rescue those who get into difficulty on the crossing from North Africa.

The interior minister, whose League party is in a new coalition government with the anti-establishment Five Star Movement, has closed Italy’s ports to migrant rescue ships in recent weeks.

“Let the Libyan authorities do their work of rescue, recovery and return [of migrants] to their country, as they have been doing for some time, without the ships of the voracious NGOs disturbing them or causing trouble,” he said.

“Italian ports are and will be closed to those who aid human traffickers.”

His intervention comes after a summit in Brussels at the weekend where the Italian government called for migrant processing centres to be set up in North Africa and EU aid directed to countries that work against human trafficking.

Rome said the EU’s borderless Schengen area, was at risk because of the migration crisis.

Italian ports are and will be closed to those who aid human traffickers

Matteo Salvini, Italy’s interior minister

The number of refugees and migrants arriving in Europe has fallen significantly in the last year after a major spike earlier in the decade, but the election of far-right parties to government in Austria and Italy has put the issue back on the agenda and pulled the EU into a renewed political crisis.

Spanish NGO Proactiva Open Arms says it has received “seven or eight” messages alerting them to boats in distress in the Mediterranean on Sunday, amounting to around 1,000 people.

One boat, the Lifeline, was in limbo with over 200 Africans on board, including pregnant women and children, after Malta and Italy refused to take it in. Another vessel, the Aquarius, earlier this month was in a similar position until it was given emergency clearance to land in Spain.

Some member states such as Italy, Spain, and Malta receive significantly more arrivals from the Middle East and North Africa because of their geographic location on the sea or overland routes. However, other countries have resisted efforts by the EU to agree quotas to redistribute migrants and share the amount of arrivals.

Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia – the main objectors to migrant quotas other than the UK – boycotted the Sunday emergency talks in Brussels.

There is also a risk of further problems upstream, with German chancellor Angela Merkel under domestic pressure from her right-wing allies to reverse her previously welcoming policy and turn away migrants who have already registered in other countries.

The issue is set to dominate the agenda at the European Council summit in Brussels on Thursday and Friday, where Brexit will also be considered.

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