Matteo Salvini: Before the trial of captain Carola Rackete, he criticized sea rescuers

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Matteo Salvini, Italy's former interior minister: Private aid organizations would cooperate with people smugglers in the Mediterranean and make themselves an instrument of human trafficking

Photo: Carlo Cozzoli / dpa

Italy's ex-Interior Minister Matteo Salvini has criticized private sea rescuers before a court case for defamation against the German activist Carola Rackete.

"It seems to me that it is clear that there is a connection between the organizers of these crossings and some, fortunately not all, private organizations," said the party leader of the right-wing Lega in Rome on Tuesday.

The 49-year-old suggested that private aid organizations were cooperating with smugglers in the Mediterranean.

They would become an instrument of human trafficking, the Milanese continued.

Private sea rescuers have already rejected similar allegations made by Salvini in the past.

They state that they fully complied with international laws.

"The more NGO ships that are present in the Mediterranean, the more people risk dying," Salvini explained.

They sit in "half-flat rubber boats" because they know that if all goes well, someone will take them with them.

Salvini was Interior Minister between June 2018 and September 2019.

Salvini faces charges in Milan on Thursday after being sued for his comments about Rackete.

According to her own statements, the German does not want to appear at the appointment.

She doesn't want to waste her time with politicians.

Salvini criticized the 34-year-old ex-captain of the Sea-Watch organization for having entered the port of Lampedusa with the "Sea-Watch 3" at the end of June 2019 without the permission of the Italian authorities.

There were around 40 boat migrants on board.

Rackete was then temporarily under house arrest.

Every year tens of thousands of migrants reach Italy via the Mediterranean Sea.

The topic is politically very controversial.

According to the Ministry of the Interior, there have been around 21,100 in 2022, which is significantly more than in the same period last year (almost 15,100).

The aid organizations criticize the fact that the Italian authorities often remain inactive for a long time, for example when it comes to assigning them a safe haven to bring rescued refugees ashore.

jso/dpa