Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi visited Lampedusa yesterday as ships were readying to evacuate 6,000 migrants from Africa who were exhausting the tiny island’s resources.
“The ‘Free Lampedusa’ plan began at midnight,” Mr Berlusconi told cheering residents. “In 48-60 hours Lampedusa will be inhabited only by the people of Lampedusa.”
Berlusconi said the first batch of more than 1,000 migrants would be taken on a civilian vessel to a reception centre in Puglia in southern Italy.
“Around 1,400 migrants will be embarked on the Excelsior which will go to Taranto from where they will be taken by bus to the tent city at Manduria,” he told reporters, without saying when the boat would sail. He repeated that the Tunisian authorities had undertaken to halt the departure of the migrants.
“Tunisia has confirmed that no more people will leave,” he said.
Mindful that residents had become increasingly weary of the migrant influx and angry over government inaction, the flamboyant premier quipped that Rome would “propose Lampedusa for the Nobel Peace Prize.”
Mr Berlusconi also promised a new golf course on the island, whose main industry is tourism, and announced that he had bought a house on Lampedusa via the internet.
“I went online and bought a house at Cala Francese called The Two Palms. I’ll be a Lampedusa citizen too,” Mr Berlusconi said.
Italy also renewed an appeal to the EU for help dealing not just with Tunisian migrants looking for a better life, but also with refugees from other parts of Africa formerly held in detention camps in Libya. Since the conflict between rebel Libyan fighters and forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi began in mid-February, Eritreans, Ethiopians and Somalis have begun turning up on Lampedusa and other islands in the Pelagian archipelago, which lies closer to north Africa than to mainland Italy.
The Italian government has previously warned that hundreds of thousands of migrants could depart for Italy’s shores if Gaddafi’s regime falls, while the Libyan leader himself has threatened to send “millions” to Europe.
“These are not just economic migrants, and we continue to ask Europe to take action,” Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said, adding that promises for “very limited European funds” were not enough.
An EU spokesman replied yesterday: “We have made around €18 million available to Italy in 2010-2011 for repatriations, on top of €25 million allocated to all member states for emergency measures.”
The migrants are mainly young men who have protested at their confinement.
Meanwhile the EU’s immigration affairs chief said yesterday European nations must step up efforts to help Italy cope with a massive influx of migrants who have fled unrest in north Africa,
“EU states want to show solidarity, then they can make this solidarity a reality,” said European Union home affairs commissioner Cecilia Malmstroem.