In his statement, the Prime Minister said the EU agreement on burden sharing was a breakthrough as it was the first time that all member states would be participating on a non-voluntary basis.

Answering questions from Dr Busuttil, Dr Muscat said the government agreed with the Opposition that the two sides should present a national front and be bipartisan on this issue.

The proposal put forward by the European Commission was an insurance policy for Malta in case of an emergency. One had to keep in mind that the current agreement with Italy could change and Malta would need the back-up of the EU.

The government would rather accept 300 screened immigrants from Greece and Italy than be faced with a sudden influx of 2,000 immigrants.

The detention policy was being fine-tuned and would be issued for consultation.

Opposition Leader Simon Busuttil said they were not happy with the results achieved as Malta was not included in the mechanism of solidarity, which only referred to Italy and Greece. If there was a country with a disproportionate number of migrants it was Malta.

The Opposition was also disappointed because the mechanism was not mandatory. Dr Muscat criticised the PN government when the Immigration Pact did not feature mandatory burden sharing. What had changed?

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