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Updated October 23rd, 2021 at 20:36 IST

Italy's former minister Matteo Salvini faces trial for blocked migrant ship in 2019

Matteo Salvini, Italy's right-wing former interior minister, was charged with kidnapping after refusing to let a Spanish migrant rescue ship to dock in Sicily.

Reported by: Anurag Roushan
Matteo Salvini
Image: AP | Image:self
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On Saturday, Italy's right-wing former interior minister Matteo Salvini was charged with kidnapping after refusing to let a Spanish migrant rescue ship to dock in Sicily in 2019, leaving the passengers onboard stranded at sea for days. It is the first trial for Salvini, who served as interior minister from 2018 to 2019 in an uneasy alliance between the populist 5-Star Movement and his right-wing League, reported The Associated Press (AP). Salvini has stated that he was "fulfilling" his duty by refusing entry to the 'Open Arms' ship and the 147 people it had rescued in the Mediterranean Sea off Libya. Salvini has taken a tough stance against migrant arrivals, stopping ships and urging Europe to shoulder some of the burden, the news agency reported

For refusing to allow the ship into port for days in August 2019, prosecutors accused Salvini of dereliction of duty and kidnapping. Some migrants flung themselves overboard in desperation during the nearly three-week standoff, and the captain urged for a safe, nearby port. Notably, some passengers were sent to land for humanitarian or health reasons, while the remaining 83 were allowed to disembark in Italy's Lampedusa. "We expect justice for the unnecessary suffering that all the people had in those 20 days," Oscar Camps, head of the Spanish NGO Open Arms, was quoted as saying by AP. Earlier this year, a court in Catania, Sicily, opted not to prosecute Salvini in a similar case in which he was accused of holding 116 migrants on board an Italian coast guard ship at sea for five days in 2019. 

'Salvini is involved in a series of legal wrangles'

It is worth mentioning here that Salvini is embroiled in a slew of legal wranglings, the majority of which stems from his time as Italy's conservative interior minister. When he assumed power in June 2018, one of his first acts was to proclaim Italian ports "closed" to ships rescuing migrants fleeing Libya by boat. Following that, there were 25 conflicts between rescue vessels and Italian officials, with some of them resulting in criminal proceedings. Notably, Salvini is regarded as a hardcore Eurosceptic politician who holds a scathing view of the European Union, particularly the euro. He also opposes both illegal immigration into Italy and the EU, as well as the EU's asylum-seeker management, reported AP

(With AP inputs)

Image: AP

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Published October 23rd, 2021 at 20:38 IST

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