Rome, March 4. The interior ministers of Italy, Cyprus, Greece, Malta and Spain are meeting today in Malta as part of the MED5 group, the first meeting between the five Mediterranean countries since the tragic sinking of the Calabria (southern Italy), in which at least 68 migrants died last Sunday.
“Everything is ready for the MED5 meeting to start in our country. During this meeting, the ministers (…) will discuss a common position on migration and asylum”, declared this Saturday on the official website the host minister, Byron Camilleri. . .
Alongside the Maltese minister, Italian Matteo Piantedosi, Spaniard Fernando Grande Marlaska and Greek Notis Mitarachi will participate, as well as Cypriot undersecretary Costas Constantinou, according to the Maltese Interior Ministry.
The interior minister of Sweden, the country which currently holds the presidency of the Council of the European Union and which Spain will take over next July, has also been invited.
Three working sessions will be held during the day, after which the Mediterranean leaders should offer a joint press conference.
“This is a golden opportunity for Malta to continue to be a leader in this area and to reach an agreement so that all MED5 countries will have the same position in the Council of Ministers in the coming days,” Camilleri said.
“Malta, together with the Mediterranean countries, will continue to press for a policy which combats human traffickers and therefore reduces deaths at sea, and for a fairer policy which guarantees protection to those who truly deserve it, while that those who do not deserve to stay in the Union will be sent back to their country,” he added.
The meeting comes less than a week after at least 68 people died off the Calabrian coast of Crotone, although the death toll is feared to be over 100.
The sinking, investigated by the Public Prosecutor’s Office, occurred last Sunday at dawn when the wooden barge in which some 180 migrants had left Turkey, according to the survivors, sank off the Calabrian coast, in very rough seas .
So far, 68 bodies have been found, Afghans, Iranians, Pakistanis and Syrians, and dozens of missing are still wanted. About 80 people managed to survive. ECE
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