The Italian Prime Minister visited the center that will host migrants rescued by Italian ships in the Mediterranean, as provided for in the agreement signed with Tirana last year.
The Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, visits Albania on Wednesday. The Prime Minister met with her Albanian counterpart, Edi Rama, and held a press conference from Shengjin portwhere a reception center will be built with reception units for migrants rescued by the Italian authorities in the Mediterranean after the agreement signed last year between Rome and Tirana.
Harshly criticized by the opposition, Meloni denied that her one-day trip was a campaign stop ineve of the elections to the European Parliament
Meloni: “Deterrent tool for illegal migrants”
“The Italians understand, they are grateful to the government, they are grateful to the Albanian people for this other important effort of friendship that they are making to give us a hand,” Meloni said from Shengjin, later adding: “We believe that the most useful element of this project is that can represent an extraordinary deterrent tool for illegal migrants destined to reach Europe. As well as, of course, an effective means of countering trafficking networks, because there are traffickers there that we try to combat, which obviously also means leading to cost containment.”
Meloni has valued the agreement with Albania, which has awakened the interest of 15 of the 27 EU member countriesas “extremely innovative” and has asked the European Commission if “the Union (could) follow the Italian model in the agreement with Albania.”
“The Italian government for us has been and always will be the government of a country for which we have a very special friendship and which is a strategic alliance that we want to develop and strengthen at every step,” Rama said.
Albania is not a member of the European Union and the idea of sending asylum seekers out of the bloc has been described by many as controversial. The deal was backed by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen as an example of “outside the box thinking” but has been widely criticized by human rights groups and the opposition, who warn that refugee protection could be compromised.
What does the agreement between Italy and Albania contribute on migrants?
Meloni began his visit to the small Western Balkan nation at Gjader, a former military airport, 80 kilometers north of the capital Tirana, where Work has begun on one of the two migrant centers. It then moved to the port of Shengjin, 20 kilometers southwest of Gjader, where a reception center with housing units and offices is located in an area of four thousand square meters and surrounded by a 5-meter-high metal fence with wire wire. spikes on top.
According to the agreement quinquennial signed by Meloni and Rama last November, Albania commits to hosting up to three thousand migrants per month. With asylum applications expected to take around a month to process, the number of asylum seekers sent to Albania could reach 36,000 in a year.
Meloni said that on August 1, both centers will be operational and the first thousand migrants will probably be brought in. Regular ferry will take place in mid-September. The two treatment centers in Albania will cost Italy 670 million euros over 5 years. The cost of bringing 36,000 migrants to Italy would cost 136 million eurosalmost equal to the amount that would be spent in Albania, according to Meloni.
What are the rules for managing centers in Albania?
The facilities would be managed entirely by Italy, while Italy is responsible for expediting migrants’ asylum applications. They are expected to be fully operational by the end of the year. Both centers are under Italian jurisdiction, while Albanian guards will ensure external security. Italy will welcome the migrants if they are granted international protection or organize their deportation from Albania if they are denied.
People picked up in Italian territorial waters, or by rescue vessels operated by non-governmental organisations, would retain the right, under international and EU law, to seek asylum in Italy and be processed there.
Rama said the agreement was a sign of gratitude to Albanians who found refuge in Italy and “escaped hell and imagined a better life” after the collapse of communism in Albania in the 1990s. According to Rama, Tirana has rejected requests from other countries for agreements similar to Italy’s.
Criticism of Meloni for his visit to Albania
The Italian prime minister has been harshly criticized by the opposition for her visit to Albania. Accused of having organized an electoral advertisement on the occasion of the European elections. “Meloni attacks me by saying that in the health bill that we have presented, which asks for public health resources and an extraordinary contracting plan, there is no idea where to get the resources from. We did not ask them to make an election announcement in Albania that cost 800 million euros“. This was said by the secretary of the Democratic Party, Elly Schlein, at a rally in Catania.
“Money taken from people fragile: why don’t we immediately put it to hire doctors and nurses“added the democrat. Next, the leader of the 5 Star Movement, Giuseppe Conte, echoed her:
“Giorgia Meloni’s is a government that does not put a single euro into healthcare, which makes an electoral announcement in Albania completely useless. The healthcare government must be handed over to competent people, enough of party leaders, friends,” Conte said at the last stop of the electoral tour at the Brancaccio theater in Rome.
“In Albania, the prime minister has made another announcement. We face state propaganda used as a blunt weapon a few days before the vote“said the secretary of the ‘AVS’, Nicola Fratoianni, during the last electoral rally in Milan.
The attack against Riccardo Magi in Albania
Meloni’s visit to Albania was also marked by the aggression against the deputy and the secretary of ‘+Europe’ by security men in the outer space of the Shengjin reception center. Magi, as can be seen in the videos posted online, was blocked while trying to approach the blue cars that were contesting the project desired by Rome and Tirana. “If this happens to a parliamentarian in front of the press cameras, imagine what will happen to the poor Christs who will arrive here with the cameras off,” Magi wrote on social networks, showing the blood on his shirt.
“Riccardo Magi threw himself in front of the Albanian Prime Minister’s car and was blocked by security, as would have happened in any other country“said Meloni in an interview on Wednesday night by Enrico Mentana on ‘Tg La7’. “I have done many electoral campaigns, even tough ones, but I would never have dreamed of doing a job when the Italian prime minister was engaged to his counterpart.” added the Italian Prime Minister.
