Italy warns migration threatens the future of the EU as Merkel’s popularity hits new low
By Peter Foster EUROPE EDITOR
and Nick Squires in Rome
ALMOST half of Germans want Angela Merkel to resign as chancellor, a poll has shown, as she comes under renewed pressure on immigration. A Yougov survey showed that 43 per cent of Germans want her out, compared with 42 per cent who say she should stay. Even in her government’s coalition 27 per cent want her to quit.
The findings demonstrate Mrs Merkel’s perilous position as she fights an internal battle with her coalition partner, the Bavarian CSU, over imposing border controls she believes will undermine free movement within the EU.
She is attending an emergency summit in Brussels tomorrow in efforts to create a “European solution” to the migration crisis which has exposed divisions in the bloc over how to handle African and Middle Eastern refugees.
But deadlock is expected as Italy demands reform of the Dublin asylum rules, while east European states like Hungary and Poland resolutely refuse to accept migrant quotas.
Italy yesterday warned that the survival of the EU was at stake as it signalled it would block MV Lifeline, a Dutchregistered ship carrying 224 asylum seekers rescued off Libya this week.
Matteo Salvini, Italy’s hardline interior minister and the head of anti-immigration League party, said the ship should head for Malta and be impounded, with the crew arrested for allegedly aiding “clandestine migration”.
“We cannot take in one more person,” Mr Salvini said. “On the contrary: we want to send a few away.”
Before next week’s EU leaders’ summit, where migration will top the agenda, Mr Salvini warned: “Within a year it will be decided whether there will still be a united Europe or not.”
To mollify Italy, Brussels called on the rest of the EU to “show solidarity” with front-line states such as Greece, Cyprus, Bulgaria and Spain, to “ease their burden and to reimburse and honour a part of their costs and efforts”.