Malta needs to be cautious about issuing humanitarian visas to migrants, given its proximity to unstable countries such as Libya, the prime minister said today.
He was questioned after several European countries said they would issue humanitarian visas to Syrian migrants. Humanitarian visas enable migrants to apply for entry to EU territory on humanitarian grounds and thereby ensure that Member States meet their international obligations.
Dr Muscat said the issue Malta faced was that it was not just migrants from Syria who came here, but migrants from other countries who came via Libya.
Malta needed to safeguard its national interest. It needed to ensure, as far as possible, that people who came here were not part of an extremist group.
Malta, he said, had always shown responsibility and solidarity with migrants, well before the heartbreaking picture of the drowned boy on a Turkish beach last week.
The boy's picture shocked him and angered him as a parent, Dr Muscat said, in the same way as other pictures of migrants which did not make it to the international media angered him int he past weeks.
"We have had this problem on our doorstep for years, hopefully the current reaction will not wane once the media shifts its focus," Dr Muscat said.
Dr Muscat also spoke on migration when he hosted lunch for members of the Order of St John to mark the 450th anniversary of the end of the Great Siege.
He said the migrant crisis was the result of the cold shoulder which Europe and the rest of the world gave to countries, including Malta Greece, Italy, Jordan and Turkey who for years had grappled with migration flows but were lift on their own.
Malta was continuing to lead by example, and had even offered to take migrants from other countries, he said. One could not advocate solidarity only when one needed it.
However this was the time for political leaders to stand and be counted. They needed to lay down a system to manage the phenomenon of migration.
When he spoke on the Great Siege, Dr Muscat said this was not about glorification of war, but a reminder of how precious peace is.