- The measure was approved by the Council of Ministers after the landing on the Italian coast of more than 3,000 migrants
The Italian government decreed a state of national immigration emergency for the next six months. This was confirmed by sources from the Ministry of the Interior to the EFE news agency. The measure could boost expulsions of migrants.
The rule was approved on April 11 by the Council of Ministers after the landing on the Italian coast of more than 3,000 people in the last three days. In addition, dozens of boats head to the country for the best weather conditions.
The Minister of Civil Protection and Maritime Policies, Nello Musumeci, proposed that the measure, which will have an initial financing of five million euros, be implemented throughout the country.
According to the advances of the media that had access to a text that has not yet been disclosed by the government, the exceptional state of emergency in immigration matters allows procedures such as the increase in the structures set up for the repatriation of migrants who do not have the right to stay in Italy.
repatriation centers
The opening of new Repatriation Centers (CPR, for its acronym in Italian) will facilitate identification and deportation activities for the authorities.
The Vice President of the Executive, Matteo Salvini, explained that he saw the need for “at least one repatriation center for each region” and advocated reapplying a “tougher” policy in the face of the migration phenomenon.
Salvini, who currently also serves as Minister of Transport, promoted in 2018 and 2019, at that time as head of the Interior, a severe anti-immigration action with some actions that are now settled in court, such as his refusal to grant landings in ports to humanitarian ships.
The official assured that Italy is “absolutely incapable” of managing “a thousand daily arrivals” and that it is crucial that Europe “wake up and intervene”. According to EFE, the last few weeks have been intense due to the arrival of thousands of migrants in southern Italy, where less than two months ago the shipwreck of a barge left more than 90 dead in the Calabria region.
He has been chatting for years, but he has never lifted a finger, and it is time to show that there is a community, a union, and that solidarity is not only the responsibility of Italy, Spain, Greece or Malta. Because a thousand arrivals a day we are absolutely incapable of supporting them economically, culturally and socially, ”she asserted.
Matteo Piantedosi, current Minister of the Interior, was another promoter of the declaration after a conversation held with Musumeci as a result of the latest landings, Interior sources told EFE.
With the state of emergency, there is also the possibility of implementing faster procedures and actions to offer migrants reception solutions in a short time and with adequate standards. This is because both Civil Protection and the Italian Red Cross will collaborate in the assistance.
“If we intervene in the countries from which we move, neutralizing the mafia of traffickers, perhaps we can avoid the worst,” Musumeci emphasized.
Musumeci stressed that the measure makes it possible to repeal some regulations of the current legal system. In addition, he indicated that it will be national because they need to help the regions because there is a risk of sending the system to collapse if this rate of arrivals continues ”.
More than 31,000 migrants have arrived in Italy in 2023
Since the start of 2023, arrivals in Italy have risen to 31,000 migrants, almost four times the 8,000 that did in the same period of 2022, according to the official count.
In the last three days, more than 3,000 migrants arrived in Italy after being treated by the coast guard, which this weekend rescued dozens of boats in distress in the central Mediterranean.
The good weather encouraged a greater number of boats, the majority coming from Tunisia (Africa), to embark on the route that connects North Africa with the coasts of Sicily and Lampedusa, whose reception centers are overflowing.
On Monday, April 10, the authorities carried out two complex and lengthy operations. The Coast Guard intercepted two ships in which 800 and 400 people were traveling in precarious conditions, respectively, located in waters close to Sicily and Calabria (south).
The rescue has not yet finished as they have run out of fuel and a large number of passengers need medical assistance.
With information from EFE