Italy's populist, anti-migrant interior minister said Friday that Malta should allow a Dutch-flagged rescue ship carrying hundreds of migrants rescued from rubber dinghies off the Libyan coast to make port there because the ship is now in Maltese waters.
"We ask humanly and politically that Malta finally opens one of its ports and lets these desperate people disembark," and then seize the ship, Matteo Salvini said.
Malta responded that it would "act according to the laws and applicable conventions," without further explanation. International law states that Malta must respond if it's the nearest safe port at rescue or if requested by the ship's captain.
The dynamic is similar to the standoff over the Aquarius, operated by French aid groups, which eventually sailed an additional 1,500 kilometres last week to deliver 630 migrants to Spain after both Malta and Italy refused to let the rescue ship access their ports. Salvini is making good on an election promise to go after rescue ships run by aid groups, which he has likened to taxi services that help the migrant smugglers.
More than 640,000 migrants have arrived in Italy since 2014, many of whom made their way northward to join family or to countries perceived as providing more assistance until Italy's neighbours enacted stricter border controls. Arrivals are down some 80 per cent this year to around 14,500, as migrants have turned to other routes.
Salvini on Thursday said he would not allow the ship operated by the German NGO Mission Lifeline to enter Italian ports, saying that it had acted improperly by taking on board the 224 migrants that the Italian coast guard had assigned to the Libyan coast guard to rescue. Salvini said the rescue was in Libyan waters, which Lifeline denies.
Mission Lifeline said Friday that it still has not been assigned a port, despite its requests. It said it picked up additional migrant passengers during another rescue overnight, and currently was heading north with 234 on board. It said it had responded to a request for help by a merchant vessel to help rescue 113 people.
Lifeline referred to reports that as many as 220 people were missing at sea and presumed drowned, according to survivor statements to the UN Refugee agency.
"The latest drownings show how important our sea rescue efforts are, and that not a single rescue ship can be missed," said Mission Lifeline founder Axel Steier. "The rescue of human lives must be prioritized before border control."
Merkel downplays expectations for Sunday meeting
German Chancellor Angela Merkel played down expectations of a major breakthrough being reached at hastily-arranged talks between some European Union leaders on Sunday on the migration dispute dividing Europe.
Plans for an emergency meeting of 10 EU leaders on Sunday before a full EU summit at the end of the week were thrown into chaos on Thursday when Italy's new prime minister said a draft paper on migration had been pulled due to a clash with Merkel.
The German chancellor's back is against a wall. She needs to get EU leaders at the June 28-29 summit to agree to share out asylum seekers more evenly to placate her conservative allies, Bavaria's Christian Social Union (CSU) but countries like Italy are very reluctant.
"The meeting on Sunday is a consultation and working meeting at which there will be no concluding statement," Merkel told reporters in Beirut with Lebanon's Prime Minister Saad Hariri.
"It is an initial exchange with interested member states."
Merkel is also working on bilateral agreements with partners like Italy and Greece to reduce the burden on Germany, possibly similar to one agreed with Turkey two years ago.
But if no "satisfactory" deal is achieved at next week's summit, German Interior Minister and CSU chief Horst Seehofer has threatened to defy Merkel and turn people away at the German border who have applied for asylum in other EU states.
National border controls would undermine the EU's open border system and could cause a German government crisis, although Merkel tried to play this down, too.
"I am working for the coalition to do its tasks as set out in the coalition agreement.… We have lots more to do," she said.
The Social Democrats, who also share power with Merkel's conservative bloc — comprising the CSU and her own Christian Democrats (CDU) — said they were ready for a new election.
"The SPD is prepared for all scenarios," SPD General Secretary Lars Klingbeil said.
Der Spiegel had reported that the party was making preparations, which would include deciding who would run for the job of chancellor.
Merkel, whose open-door approach has resulted in the arrival of over 1.6 million migrants in Germany since 2014, will also discuss the issue with Spain's new Prime Minister, Pedro Sanchez, on Tuesday in Berlin.