Italy’s new populist, anti-Muslim migration government that is making good on its promise to cut off illegal Muslim migration is causing a meltdown in Libya and a lot of handwringing in Europe.Matteo Salvini, Italy’s deputy prime minister/interior minister, reiterated his government’s plan to stop illegal migrants from arriving while starting deportations of hundreds of thousands illegally squatting in Italy. Italy no longer will be Europe’s refugee camp.
Express ILLEGAL migrants are then crossing Europe and using increasingly devious ways to evade detection, including hiding in “coffin-sized” secret compartments in vehicles. Migration across the Mediterranean from Africa is a critical issue for the EU, with member states arguing over the best way to deal with it.
Last month saw Italy turn away boats carrying thousands of illegal Muslim migrants rescued from the sea while Angela Merkel’s leadership of Germany has come under threat as she faces pressure to reach a deal to cope with the issue.
Tom Dowdall, NCA deputy director of organized immigration crime, said the problem was growing. Attempted crossings to Greece and Turkey are up by 47 per cent on last year, with those to Spain and Italy up by 75 per cent. They have not reached the peak levels of 2015, caused after Mrs Merkel made a controversial decision to open Germany’s borders and allow more than a million Muslim invaders posing as refugees in.
Chris Hogben, NCA head of operations for organised immigration crime, said rescue boats manned by non-governmental organisations were knowingly aiding illegal people smugglers. The NGOs are supposed to rescue people once they are more than 12 miles from the Libyan coast, but come in much closer, he said.
The main sources for migrants into Europe are Libya, Ethiopia, Sudan, Niger and Afghanistan. Mr Dowdall said that smugglers collectively make up to £6billion a year charging would-be migrants.
A single boat from Africa to Europe can net them up to £300,000. He said after the destruction of the Jungle camp in Calais in 2016, which had up to 10,000 migrants, the issue has now shifted to Belgium.
He said: “Organised crime gangs are loading people into lorries, before bringing them through France and onto the UK. There are adapted hides in the rear of vehicles, an area for six to eight people, with welded false doors, and coffi n ‘hides’.” Mr Dowdall said “complicit lorry drivers” were charging up to £2,000 per migrant. Iraqi Kurd, Afghan and Albanian gangs were the most prolific people smugglers to the UK.
On Thursday, illegal immigrant Albanian Afrim Xhekaliu, 41, of Barnet, north London, was jailed for six years at Lewes Crown Court for trying to smuggle eight people into the UK in a boat.
He was caught in January when it ran out of fuel off the coast of Eastbourne and they had to be rescued. Last month, as part of an NCA probe into a gang thought to be behind many attempts to get corrupt truck drivers to smuggle people from Belgium to the UK, investigators held three Albanian nationals in London.
So, where are a bunch of migrants getting the money to sue Italy? Can everyone say “George Soros.”
RED WHITE AND BLUE 