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Migrants gather outside the operational center called “Hotspot” on the Italian island of Lampedusa on September 14, 2023. The number of migrants arriving in Italy after crossing on boats from North Africa has surged this year, at almost 124,000 since January — up from 65,500 during the same period in 2022, according to government data. Many land on the island of Lampedusa, where the reception centre on September 13, 2023 warned it was reaching critical capacity. (Photo by Alessandro Serranò / AFP) (Photo by ALESSANDRO SERRANO/AFP via Getty Images)
Lampedusa crisis

Policy

Monday 18 September 2023

Lampedusa crisis

Senior Reporter

Will Brown
Migrants gather outside the operational center called “Hotspot” on the Italian island of Lampedusa on September 14, 2023. The number of migrants arriving in Italy after crossing on boats from North Africa has surged this year, at almost 124,000 since January — up from 65,500 during the same period in 2022, according to government data. Many land on the island of Lampedusa, where the reception centre on September 13, 2023 warned it was reaching critical capacity. (Photo by Alessandro Serranò / AFP) (Photo by ALESSANDRO SERRANO/AFP via Getty Images)

Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, visited Lampedusa on Sunday with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni for a sanitised trip to a migration centre – which had probably been hastily cleared up for their arrival. More than 11,500 migrants have arrived on the Italian island in the past week and far-right social media is awash with talk of an “invasion”. More than 126,000 migrants have arrived in Italy this year, double the figure from 2022 (and at least 2,000 have died trying to cross the Mediterranean this year). Von der Leyen promised a vague-sounding 10-point EU action plan. But Meloni wants an EU naval blockade of the North African coast. Her government is playing both sides. As the pair went on their brief Lampedusa sojourn, Matteo Salvini, the deputy PM, hosted the far-right French leader Marine Le Pen to discuss how to protect “our peoples against [an organised] migratory submersion.” 

Photograph Getty Images

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