EU summit with interior ministers takes place today. Piantedosi: “Enough with the taboos. Now we need new hub models in third countries”

“I would like to make the nature of our decision on the temporary reinstatement of internal air and sea border controls absolutely clear: this is in no way a measure directed against Spain or any other partner. It is a precautionary and organisational decision, intended to safeguard national security and the integrity of the entire European border control system at a time of severe strain, as has been the case on numerous other occasions.” This was stated by the Minister for the Interior, Matteo Piantedosi, in his address to the Justice and Home Affairs Council, convened by the Irish Presidency following the Ceuta emergency, partly in response to the letter initiated by Giorgia Meloni and the Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, and signed by 20 other Member States, regarding the migration crisis in Spain. The minister expressed to the Spanish government Italy’s “sincere solidarity. We know full well what it means to be on the front line facing an extraordinary emergency, as happened during 2023, particularly in Lampedusa, when thousands of people landed on our territory in the space of a few months,” he recalled, with a hint of controversy. “We had only been in government for a few months and had to tackle those emergencies with new tools that we had to devise from scratch. And let me say frankly that on that occasion, Italy did not receive the necessary and expected solidarity that we would have anticipated.” 

“We have created a new legislative framework at European level and the time has now come to put the new hub models into practice for the external management of asylum procedures and for returns to safe third countries, moving beyond the old ideological taboos of the past,” continued Piantedosi. According to him, “in this regard, Italy has led the way with the Italy–Albania Protocol, which has attracted the interest of an ever-growing majority of Member States. Processing asylum claims through accelerated border procedures and carrying out returns directly within facilities managed in safe third countries constitute the strongest possible deterrent against human trafficking and irregular migration flows”. 

The meeting is also attended by the Schengen-associated countries (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland) and the European External Action Service (EEAS). It is chaired by the Irish Minister for Justice, Home Affairs and Migration, Jim O’Callaghan. The Italian government’s plan is to expand the ‘Albania model’. There is already a preliminary list of countries that could host the new hubs, many of which are in Africa. These include Ghana, Senegal, Tunisia, Libya, Mauritania, Egypt, Uganda, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Montenegro and Ethiopia. Among the likely candidates, in particular, are Uganda – in which Germany, Austria and the Netherlands have already expressed an interest – and Montenegro.

The contents of today’s meeting were discussed yesterday during the meeting of the Permanent Representatives of the 27 (Coreper), at which Italy – according to sources at Palazzo Chigi – reiterated the main points of the letter signed last Friday by 22 heads of state and government of the European Union, “reaffirming the need for a European approach to tackling irregular migration flows”. Specifically, Italy emphasised that the protection of external borders and the strengthening of the external dimension of migration policy “must form the cornerstones of the Union’s action, not least given that the proper functioning of the Schengen area depends on the integrity of the external borders”. Reference was also made to the need to strengthen the tools for combating irregular migration, “by eliminating pull factors and enhancing the Union’s deterrent capacity”. These issues are likely to feature prominently again today, with regard to the urgent need to step up cooperation with third countries and make returns more effective – including by moving swiftly to launch pilot projects for the establishment of return hubs in third countries – as well as to adapt the international legal framework to the challenges posed by modern irregular migration.

The hours leading up to the meeting were rather tense. Yesterday, in fact, the Spanish Foreign Minister, José Manuel Albares, attacked the government in Rome, claiming that it had ‘failed to rise to the challenge’ regarding the Ceuta crisis. He then went on to criticise the Spanish right for its ‘irresponsible’ positions. One of its leading figures, Santiago Abascal Conde (leader of the far-right political party Vox), welcomed Palazzo Chigi’s decision to suspend the Schengen Agreement following the Ceuta crisis, earning praise from Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini.

Albares’ remarks were followed by figures from the Ministry of the Interior. According to these, “in Italy, from January this year to the present day, there has been a sharp fall in the number of irregular migrant arrivals, achieved precisely thanks to the policies of the Meloni government”. These results were also claimed by Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, who emphasised that the new EU Pact on Asylum and Migration “bears a distinct Italian stamp, following in the footsteps of Silvio Berlusconi and the governments he led”. Yet it was precisely during those governments that two amnesties were introduced (in 2002 under the Bossi-Fini law, and another in 2009), alongside a 2006 immigration quota decree, leading to the regularisation of over a million people.