Day of truth, for Europe, on theimmigration. This afternoon, at 16 in Brussels will meet the Extraordinary European Council strongly desired by Italy after the tragedy of migrants which took place last weekend in the waters of the Mediterranean, off the coast of Libya.
We need a decisive change of pace or as the Prime Minister Matteo Renzi "a political solution", a concrete action to counter the phenomenon of landings, to avoid other tragedies of the sea caused by what the Italian premier has never hesitated to define as "a form of modern slavery“. The premier hopes that concrete answers can be obtained from today's meeting and that the appropriate go-ahead will be given, in particular on three points.
The first point is the assignment of a strong mandate from all EU countries to the High Representative Federica Mogherini to study the possible actions to destroy the boats and capture the smugglers. The second point is related to distribution within all EU countries of refugees and asylum seekersbeyond a certain threshold. The third node is above all humanitarian and aims in part to return to the old way of dealing with the issue of migrants arriving from Africa: extend Triton and Poseidon (both European missions) also to the rescue of refugees at sea while now the two missions aim only at naval surveillance.
In fact, compared to what happened before with the Italian Mare Nostrum mission, with Triton there is no provision for the search and rescue of migrants traveling on death boats in the Mediterranean because the European mission only provides for the control of international waters up to 30 miles from the it costs.
Le differences between Triton and Mare Nostrum they are not few and they are not even marginal. Mare Nostrum it was an activity managed only by our country and which cost around 9 million euros a month through which the rescue of boats loaded with migrants at the mercy of the Italian coasts was also guaranteed. Triton it is an operation launched by the European agency Frontex, effectively replacing Mare Nostrum. For the Triton mission, Frontex allocates a third of the amount that was spent by Italy for Mare Nostrum. And what's more, we repeat, Triton, unlike Mare Nostrum, does not provide for the rescue of migrants far from the maritime borders of European states. The sacrosanct objective of the Italian Government is to transform Triton into a new Mare Nostrum but extended to all European countries.
Another very delicate point in the story of the landings is the solution to be adopted to stop the trafficking of migrants upstream. The hypothesis is growing naval blockade, a solution that is anything but peaceful and which could threaten the sovereignty of the state of Libya. In this regard, the government of Tripoli, not recognized by international diplomacy, has said it is ready to collaborate with the European authorities to stop the flow of migrants but, at the same time, has underlined that it will not accept bombings on the Libyan coast to destroy boats used by traffickers. In an interview with the Times of Malta newspaper, Muhammed El-Ghirani, the Foreign Minister of the Tripol government, denounced the absence of any consultation with the EU on plans to attack smugglers' boats, insisting that such actions they cannot be unilateral.
