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IMMIGRATION

Italy ‘can cope’ with huge boat migrant wave

More than 24,000 immigrants landed on Italy's shores in the last year, the interior minister said on Thursday, but insisted the situation had not reached a crisis point.

Italy 'can cope' with huge boat migrant wave
A picture released by the Italian coast guard shows coast guards helping immigrants out of their dinghy on August 8th off Lampedusa. Photo: HO/Guardia Costiera/AFP

Almost 9,000 arrived in a single 40-day period between July 1st and August 10th this year, Angelino Alfano told reporters.

Despite the wave, illegal immigration had not yet become an "unmanageable situation", he said, as Italy struck a delicate balance between its duty to legitimate asylum seekers and the right to secure its borders.

Three boats carrying a total of 280 immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa were rescued overnight on Wednesday in the Mediterranean Sea between Sicily and Tunisia.

Taking advantage of calm waters, the influx has intensified in recent weeks, especially in Sicily and Calabria in the south.

In July, Pope Francis visited Italy's southernmost island of Lampedusa on his first trip outside Rome to mourn the thousands of migrants who have died crossing the Mediterranean, often in tiny vessels unsuited to such journeys.

Lampedusa is a common point of entry for illegal immigrants.

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IMMIGRATION

France ‘will not welcome migrants’ from Lampedusa: interior minister

France "will not welcome migrants" from the island, Gérald Darmanin has insisted

France 'will not welcome migrants' from Lampedusa: interior minister

France will not welcome any migrants coming from Italy’s Lampedusa, interior minister Gérald Darmanin has said after the Mediterranean island saw record numbers of arrivals.

Some 8,500 people arrived on Lampedusa on 199 boats between Monday and Wednesday last week, according to the UN’s International Organisation for
Migration, prompting European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen to travel there Sunday to announce an emergency action plan.

According to Darmanin, Paris told Italy it was “ready to help them return people to countries with which we have good diplomatic relations”, giving the
example of Ivory Coast and Senegal.

But France “will not welcome migrants” from the island, he said, speaking on French television on Tuesday evening.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has called on Italy’s EU partners to share more of the responsibility.

The recent arrivals on Lampedusa equal more than the whole population of the tiny Italian island.

The mass movement has stoked the immigration debate in France, where political parties in the country’s hung parliament are wrangling over a draft law governing new arrivals.

France is expected to face a call from Pope Francis for greater tolerance towards migrants later this week during a high-profile visit to Mediterranean city Marseille, where the pontiff will meet President Emmanuel Macron and celebrate mass before tens of thousands in a stadium.

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