In an effort to deal with the rising number of migrants, Italy has released a plan that will help increase forced and voluntary repartition of migrants who have received deportation orders. Under pressure from their EU neighbors Italy stopped offering waivers to incoming migrants to cross into other countries, creating a bottleneck of migrants who are stuck in their country.
Last year a record number 180,000 migrants arrived in Italy by boat bringing the total to about half a million since 2014. Italian authorities were able to cut down the reviewing time for asylum applications by almost three-quarters. They denied around 60% of asylum applications, increasing the number of illegal aliens in their country from an estimated 300,000 in 2013 to 435,000 in 2016.
In an effort to deal with the increase the new Prime Minister, Paolo Gentiloni, has unveiled his plan that will include opening up 16 new dentition centers in order to increase forced repartitions of migrants back to their home countries. Only 4,600 deportations were made in the first 10 months of 2016.
In order to help increase repatriations Italy is also working on making fresh agreements with countries like Sudan to increase cooperation with accepting their migrants back and helping to identify those who have “lost” their identification.
Italy is also going to follow Sweden’s lead in increasing voluntary repartitions by offering the migrants $3,000 to return home. They are aiming to send 3,000 voluntary repatriations back by 2018.
“Severe measures in dealing with illegal immigration allow us to be stronger in helping with integration,” said Interior Minister Marco Minniti this month.
Read more on this story at The Wall Street Journal.
