Libya has stopped more than 40,000 illegal immigrants trying to reach Europe so far this year but the number of those desperate to leave Africa is swelling, Libya's interior minister said yesterday.

Libya, one of the biggest jumping off points for Africans trying to reach Europe, has come in for criticism for not doing enough to stem the flow. Interior Minister Naser Al Mabrouk Abdallah, on a visit to Rome, said it was doing all it could.

"Libya can only deal with the consequences of illegal immigration to the same extent that Europe does," Mr Al Mabrouk Abdallah said in a joint news conference with his Italian counterpart Giuseppe Pisanu.

Italy and Libya have a pact forcing Libya to patrol its coast more effectively and repatriate illegal immigrants who reach Italian shores.

The deal has provoked criticism from human rights groups and the United Nations refugee agency UNHCR.

Mr Al Mabrouk Abdallah said that in 2001 Libya stopped 4,270 illegal immigrants trying to make it to Europe. By last year, that number had risen to 40,000 people and this year it had already exceeded that.

"Up until the end of September this year there have been more than 40,000. We are dealing with constantly rising numbers of people," he said.

No one knows how many migrants die trying to cross the Mediterranean from Libya's long coast to countries like Italy, Malta and Spain, hoping to start a new life in the European Union.

But interior ministers are increasingly calling for a coordinated solution to alleviate the situation.

Malta's Home Affairs Minister Tonio Borg said in an interview with Reuters this week that the tiny Mediterranean island needed more help from Libya and the EU to cope with the rise in migration and the racial backlash it had provoked.

Mr Al Mabrouk Abdallah said Libya was continuing to crack down on traffickers as well as migrants, and had held 120 trials linked to the illegal traffic of migrants so far this year.

More than 5,290 foreigners were named in the trials together with 35 Libyans, he said.