Italy wants Libya to set up desert camps

ITALY has called for reception centres to be set up at Libya’s southern borders to help stop migrants crossing the Mediterranean.

Interior minister Matteo Salvini, whose far-right League party has campaigned to bar migrants fleeing Africa and expel those already in Italy, did not say in which countries the centres should be located.

Libya has been the main point of departure for migrants trying to reach Europe since routes from Turkey were largely shut after a deal with the EU in 2016.

Crossings have fallen sharply after Italy and Libya’s EU-trained coastguard stepped up pressure on smuggling networks. Following a meeting with Libyan interior minister Abdulsalam Ashour and deputy prime minister Ahmed Maiteeq in the capital Tripoli, Mr Salvini said: ‘Reception and identification centres should be set up (in or to) the south of Libya.’

He thanked Libya for its ‘excellent work’ in rescuing and intercepting migrants and said the countries were in ‘full agreement’ over immigration.

But Mr Maiteeq said that while Libya was ready to tackle migration, ‘we completely reject any migrant camps’ in the country. He said: ‘This is not allowed under Libyan law and regulations.’ Mr Salvini has said Italians are fed up with other EU countries’ unwillingness to take a fair share of migrants who reach the bloc via Italy.

He has vowed not to allow charity ships to disembark migrants in Italy. One vessel with more than 600 migrants was rejected before being accepted by Spain. A second carrying more than 230 migrants is still in the Mediterranean. A ship has also been waiting since it picked up 113 migrants off southern Italy on Friday.

EU leaders have been at odds over how to handle migrants since arrivals rocketed to more than a million in 2015.

The feud has weakened unity across the EU and undermined its Schengen freetravel area.