A probe against Interior Minister
Matteo Salvini for allegedly kidnapping 177 Eritrean migrants
aboard the Diciotti coast guard ship will be a "boomerang",
Salvini said Monday.
An Agrigento prosecutor has placed Salvini under
investigation for kidnapping the migrants, who were allegedly
unlawfully held for five days at sea and then another five days
at Catania harbour.
Salvini said he was not "cowed" and that he would not ask the
Senate to refuse to lift his immunity from prosecution.
"I only did my job as minister and I'm ready to do it again,"
Salvini said.
Some 100 of the migrants will go to a Catholic centre at
Rocca di Papa near Rome, Pope Francis said.
Albania and Ireland will take about 20 each.
Three Egyptians and a Bangladeshi have been arrested on
charges of being the migrant traffickers.
The other deputy premier, Industry and Labour Minister Luigi
Di Maio, said in the next such case Italy "will negotiate
directly with individual States".
He said the government was defending Italy's interests.
Most of the Eritrean migrants from the Diciotti will be moved
from a Messina hotspot to a Catholic Church centre at Ariccia
near Rome, the Italian Bishops' Conference (CEI) told a news
agency on Monday.
"They will be moved as soon as possible, in the coming hours,
to the Ariccia centre run by Auxiluim, pending their transfer to
the many diocese who have given their availability: Turin,
Brescia, Bologna, Agrigento, Cassano all'Jonio, Rossano
Calabro, to cite only those I know about," CEI's head of social
communications, Father Ivan Maffeis, told the SIR religious news
agency.
The CEI agreed to take in about 100 of the migrants while
Albania and Ireland took 20 each to end a stand-off after
Salvini kept them aboard saying they would not land until the EU
agred to take them.
Meanwhile Germany said funding the EU budget is an
obligation laid down in the EU's founding treaties, commenting
on Italy's threat to withhold some of its alleged 20 billion
euro EU budget payment unless the EU agreed to take in the
Diciotti migrants.
EU budget funding "was ratified in the European treaties, and
it is valid for all," said Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman
Steffen Seibert.
The EU must change its tune on migrants or Italy's budget
veto will be "certain", Deputy Premier Luigi Di Maio said
Monday.
Di Maio was speaking after European Budget Commissioner
Guenther Oettinger said Monday that Italy doesn't pay 20 billion
euros a year to the EU budget as stated by Di Maio in
threatening to cut it unless the EU took in the Diciotti
migrants, but 14-16 billion.
"Taking into account what it receives from the EU budget that
leaves a net contribution of three billion a year," Oettinger
said.
Di Maio replied that Oettinger's description of his claim as
a "farce" "shows what consideration they have of our country".
"They're evidently used to Italian premiers and ministers
going cap in hand to Brussels".
"Funding is not a dogma," said Di Maio, leader of the
anti-establishment 5-Star Movement, and also industry and labour
minister.
"The music in Europe is going to change," he said, saying
that soon there would be talk of "real solidarity and not
restrictions that are unsustainable from both the social and
economic standpoint".
European Parliament President Antonio Tajani said Monday that
said you can't criminally try a policy like Salvini's hardline
stance on migrant non-reception.
"You can't try a political line, in the end Salvini will be
acquitted by the ministerial court and then it becomes only a
propaganda clash that doesn't solve the real problem: neither
the immigration one nor the that of the separation of powers,"
Tajani said.
"The affair strongly highlights the problem of justice
reform, we can't waste any more time".
Italians overestimate the presence of migrants in their
country more than any other nationality in the EU, according to
a survey by think tank Istituto Cattaneo out on Monday.
The study on the phenomenon of immigration in Italy and its
perception said those polled overestimated the presence of
migrants by 18%.
Immigrants in Italy account for roughly 8% of the overall
population.
The poll also found that 74% of the Italians interviewed were
convinced that immigrants were responsible for higher crime
rates against a European average of 57%.
A reported 58% of those interviewed for the survey also said
they thought more immigration would imply fewer jobs for
residents in Italy against a European average of about 14%.
There are "points of convergence" between Italy and Hungary
on immigration policy, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter
Szijjarto said on the eve of Tuesday's meeting between Premier
Viktor Urban and Salvini.
Szijjarto said "the defence of Europe's borders consists in
managing immigration.
"Hungary has already demonstrated that land borders can be
defended.
"Australia and Italy have shown that maritime borders can be
defended too".
Meanwhile a cargo of boat people reached Vietnam as
Australia's No Way naval blockade against migrants - which
Salvini says he wants to emulate - showed its first 'hole' in
four years.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © Copyright ANSA
