Italian Prime Minister Georgia Meloni called on Thursday for Spain’s suspension from the EU’s visa-free Schengen travel zone after thousands of migrants entered the Spanish exclave of Ceuta adjoining Morocco.
“We are in the process of bringing together the competent bodies and, once these meetings are over, we are ready to act, including through exceptional measures… such as suspending the Schengen agreement with Spain,” Meloni said on X.
Her comments echoed similar remarks made earlier in the day by Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani.
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She said images from Ceuta showing the migrants were “shocking”.
Most of them, including children, had had to swim to get there.
The Spanish government’s delegation in the tiny enclave told AFP that at least nine people had died trying to reach Ceuta that way.
“Italy will not stand idly by,” Meloni declared.
Tajani earlier made a similar call.
“I am in favour of closing the Schengen area with Spain,” he wrote on X. “Irregular and uncontrolled immigration poses a danger to national security,” he claimed.
“The images coming from Ceuta show how the Madrid government’s decision to grant Spanish, and therefore European, citizenship to over 500,000 irregular immigrants is profoundly wrong and encourages human trafficking,” he argued.
Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Luis Albares responded to Tajani by accusing him of weaponising immigration for political ends.
He said such remarks were “improper” for “a partner and friendly country from which we expect European solidarity and not partisan demagoguery”.
The Schengen Area is a system of open borders spanning 29 European countries that have officially abolished controls at their common borders.
Italy’s far-right deputy prime minister, Matteo Salvini, has called for the entire Schengen zone to be suspended altogether.
