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| Europe |
| Italy and Libya move on migrants |
| 2004-09-26 |
| Italy's Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu visits Libya on Sunday to begin implementing a landmark agreement on curbing illegal immigration to the EU. The deal was reached last month between Libya's Colonel Gaddafi and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. The EU cancelled its embargo last week on selling military equipment to Libya, allowing Italy to provide supplies for joint operations with Libyan police. These include night-vision equipment, military vehicles and helicopters. Naval and coastguard personnel from both countries will also patrol together. Libya's thousands of kilometres of desert and maritime frontiers are difficult to police, but both countries have a strong interest in bringing the flood of illegal immigrants from other parts of Africa to Libya under control. Mr Pisanu told the Italian parliament recently that up to a million Africans and Asians were waiting on Libyan soil for sea transport to Italy provided by people-smugglers. Similar agreements signed by the Italians with Tunisia and Albania have drastically reduced the number of arrivals of illegal immigrants seeking entry into the EU from those countries. The problem of deterring illegal immigrants from third countries who transit through Libya is more complex to solve. |
| Posted by:tipper |