“You stop the illegal immigrants” –

“We must not be afraid to explore new solutions” to combat the phenomenon of mass illegal immigration. Keir Starmer takes a lesson from Giorgia Meloni on the migrant dossier. In the bilateral meeting held at the Casino del Bel Respiro in Villa Doria Pamphilj, in Rome, the two leaders shared a line of action that aims to intensify the fight against human trafficking, combining efforts much more and working on greater security cooperation between police forces, intelligence services and judicial authorities. An approach that aims to maximize collaboration between European and global partners, making greater and better use of entities such as Interpol and Europol. During the face-to-face meeting with the British Prime Minister, the third after those in Washington and Oxford, the Prime Minister recalled how “the two governments have been working side by side for some time now to seek structured long-term responses to the many great challenges of our time”.

The meeting was therefore used to adopt a Joint Declaration that confirms the ambition of both “to continue to strengthen and deepen the strategic partnership between the two Nations in every area of ​​common interest”. Thus, among other things, it was agreed to jointly promote partnerships on migration with countries of origin and transit, while deepening cooperation through practical measures, such as voluntary humanitarian repatriations, and to explore further areas of joint action. In short, as Meloni explained after the meeting and the subsequent working breakfast, the issue of migrants was “widely discussed”. And the Italy-Albania protocol also ended up on the table, “a solution for which the government of Great Britain shows great attention”. For Starmer, moreover, “Italy has shown that it can be done” to fight human traffickers. “Here there have been rather drastic reductions” in arrivals, he added after visiting this morning, accompanied by Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi, the National Coordination Center for Immigration established at the Department for Public Security.

“Irregular immigration is a common challenge,” the Labor prime minister made clear. “I have always said that preventing people from leaving is better than managing their arrivals. We are very pragmatic, when we see a challenge, we discuss it with our friends and allies, and we talk about the different approaches to implement, evaluating what works and what doesn’t.” And for Meloni, the Albanian model can become “a key to addressing the issue of flows in a different way.” The opening of the two centers in Shengjin and Gjader will take “a few more weeks,” but Meloni reiterated that “it cannot be argued that what Italy is doing with Albania violates the human rights of migrants. This accusation is unfounded because the jurisdiction in the centers is Italian and European, so these migrants will receive exactly the same treatment they would have had in Lampedusa or any other Italian hotspot.”

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Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi spoke about Starmer’s visit, explaining how they “illustrated in detail the collaborations initiated with the countries of origin and transit of the flows and this was appreciated. It is very positive to be supported by countries like Great Britain in these collaborations: Italy has taken the lead and expanding the front to combat illegal immigration is of great prospect”.