Italy can't be left alone to cope with migrants says Weber

(ANSA) - ROME, NOV 11 - Italy can't be left to cope with migrants arriving from North Africa on its own, the head of the European People's Party (EPP), Manfred Weber, told Premier Giorgia Meloni in Rome on Friday.
    Weber was speaking amid a big spat between Italy and France on a migrant boat that was refused entry into Italian ports and ended up in France, spurring Paris to cancel the relocation of 3,500 migrants from Italy and urge other EU members to do the same.
    Both countries have blamed the other for the row.
    "Italy and France must find a common agreement on the great challenges ahead of us, and everyone must respond to the challenge of migration," Weber told a press conference after meeting Meloni, whose Brothers of Italy (FdI) part is not in the EPP but is part of the European Conservatives and Reformists group along with Spain's Vox, Poland's Law and Justice party and the Sweden Democrats.
    "What we need is a European solution, we do not need battles between Italy and France, or other countries," Weber went on.
    "This solution must combine two aspects: strict and strong border controls, as we did at the border between Turkey and Greece; the second is solidarity, Italy cannot be left alone, we must show solidarity at the European level". (ANSA).