The Maltese government has urged Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini to check his facts before accusing Malta of failing to fulfil voluntary migrant reallocation pledges.

In a statement, the government expressed "disdain and surprise" at what it described as inaccurate allegations by Mr Salvini, who is renowned for his anti-migrant agenda.

The Italian right-wing leader in a tweet accused Malta of failing to relocate migrants it had pledged to take from his country, as opposed to Germany, France, Spain, Portugal and Ireland.

But the Maltese government recalled that Italy had pledged to take 50 migrants from Malta after the NGO vessel Lifeline docked in Malta at the end of another bitter political dispute.

When another case occurred in July and Italy requested support for a voluntary intra-EU reallocation of migrants, Malta was the first nation to respond by pledging to take migrants from Italy, the same number Rome had earlier pledged to take from Malta in the Lifeline case.

After several requests from Malta, when the Italian and Maltese experts eventually got together to decide the modalities to fulfil these pledges it was agreed that since both countries had agreed to take the same amount from each other and since these migrants had already suffered a difficult crossing and rescue, that rather than have them undergo another voyage to another state, each country would retain 50 and thus fulfil its pledges by cancelling each other’s pledge, the government said.

Therefore, Malta retained the 50 migrants who arrived on board the Lifeline that should have been transferred to Italy and Rome retained 50 from the Pozzallo case that should have been transferred to Malta. 

It pointed out that the European Commission, which was coordinating the modalities of these voluntary reallocation initiatives, considered both Malta and Italy to have fulfilled their pledges to each other.

The government therefore urged the Italian government to "revise its statistics and refrain from repeating unfounded claims".