More than 170,000 migrants arrived in Italy across the Mediterranean in 2014, Italian Justice Minister Andrea Orlando said on Wednesday.
In 2013, the total was just 42,000, Orlando said during a constitutional affairs hearing in the Senate.
Between 2013-15, 327 boats, containing 59,555 migrants, arrived along the Sicilian coast, close to the city of Siracusa.
There were also "360 arrests for aiding and abetting illegal immigration and 47 boat seizures," Orlando said.
Migrant arrivals in 2015 could surpass those in 2014. The UN has estimated that more than 100,000 migrants have already arrived so far this year.
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