EU border agency begins work in Italy but is delayed in Spain

A rapid reaction team set up by the EU's border agency and aimed at safeguarding the bloc's external borders began work on Lampedusa on Thursday (3 Aug), Italy's interior ministry said.

Three officials from the EU's Frontex border agency arrived on the remote southern Mediterranean island the day before in response to appeals for EU assistance from interior minister Giulia Amato. The European unit is tasked with analysing the migrant landings in southern Italy and with organising joint patrols in the Mediterranean as part of a campaign against illegal immigration. Mr Amato told his parliament that Italy and the EU had a "moral obligation to put an end to the inhuman phenomenon" of illegal immigration, according to Italian daily La Repubblica.

A recently leaked UN report said that organised criminal groups make more than $300 million a year from the savings of illegal immigrants seeking a better life in Europe. Mr Amato added he hoped a summit between EU and African states to discuss the immigration crisis would take place in the next few months.

Frontex delay
However, the Frontex operation that was supposed to have started on the Canary Islands, where help is also badly needed, has been delayed. "Within the next days this operation should be in movement," a commission spokeswoman said on Thursday. "These are issues that concern the budget," she said explaining the delay.

Spanish daily El Pais said that the commission administration caused the delay as it needed to approve the unfreezing of €3.4 million for the operation. As the border agency did not spend its entire budget last year, it is seeking to spend that money instead of the money from this year's budget. The delay is being caused by the commission having to modify Frontex' accounts, a process that can last three weeks, the paper said. EU Justice Commissioner Franco Frattini said in an interview with La Repubblica newspaper on Thursday that Italy, Greece and Malta would begin joint naval patrols before the end of this month.

The boats keep coming
In the meantime, the number of immigrants heading for Europe's borders continues to increase. On Wednesday alone (2 Aug) at least 360 illegal immigrants were stopped in Malaga, Granada, Almeria and the Canary Islands.

In Italy, Mr Amato said that migrant landings in southern Italy almost doubled between 2004 and 2005, from 13,000 to 23,000 - and had already reached 11,000 in the first seven months of this year. When picked up, illegal immigrants are taken into custody for identification procedures and to allow authorities to determine whether they are eligible for asylum.

Many of the thousands of migrants reaching Italy's shores from north Africa are bona fide refugees from conflicts in the Horn of Africa and elsewhere, but the majority are so-called economic refugees seeking a better life in Europe. Italy granted refugee status to 907 migrants and gave 4,375 temporary humanitarian residence permits in 2005, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said, according to French news agency AFP.