The tensions between Italy and Germany over NGO funding have not been resolved, far from it. Berlin has kept the point, stating that saving migrants at sea is a "legal and moral duty", but Defense Minister Guido Crosetto counterattacked: Italy with its means helps "most of the refugees and if they want to help us seriously, do so by supporting the Mattei Plan for Africa". My colleague Antonio Tajani is on the same line. "We are on Europe's side but it does not mean being mute and acquiescent," warned the Italian Foreign Minister, who will fly to the German capital on Thursday to ask his colleague Annalena Baerbock for clarification. And given that the challenge is played out not only on landings, but also on the internal borders of the EU, the Foreign Minister will be in Paris tomorrow to reiterate that on the rejections to Ventimiglia "France is wrong". And in the evening came the assist of French President Emmanuel Macron for whom "we cannot leave Italians alone". Germany's decision to allocate up to 800,127 euros per project for NGOs that deal with migrants in Italy, both in reception and rescue at sea, was greeted with "amazement" by Palazzo Chigi when it was formalized, but for Berlin it is a step in line with the priority of "saving lives". A task carried out "by national coast guards, in particular the Italian one", but also by "civilian rescuers in the central Mediterranean", explained a spokesman for the German Foreign Ministry replying to ANSA to a request for comment on the interview in which Crosetto defined "very serious" that Germany finances non-governmental organizations. In Rome, the government believes that this pro-NGO intervention harms Italy, indeed. In the rejoinder to the German government, the head of Defense explained that he would "expect help and solidarity in a moment of difficulty", but "their response was almost exclusively to help and finance some German and non-German NGOs". Tajani also spoke of "strange attitude" on the part of Berlin. "Do you want migrants to arrive in Italy and then not go to Germany?" asked the Foreign Ministry. The Rome-Berlin tension is also the result of distances over the so-called secondary movements. Germans complain that they are the country with the highest number of asylum seekers and cannot do more. And in this game there is also France, which to curb the wave that has grown with the massive arrivals in Lampedusa has decided to lock down the border of Ventimiglia, rejecting refugees. A "wrong" choice, as the EU Court of Justice has also established, is Tajani's reply, who tomorrow will say it clearly to Minister Catherine Colonna in a face-to-face meeting in Paris. Italy does not question the problems related to secondary movements, but it is precisely for this reason that the migrant dossier must be addressed at European level, in a "solidarity and not selfish" way, is Tajani's reasoning. Which looks at "a long-term strategy, with diplomatic and economic action that aims at investments in the African continent". As in Tunisia, where despite the difficult gestation of the EU Memorandum promoted by Italy, Brussels has announced shortly the disbursement of the first <> million. European action must then be accompanied by a UN intervention, requested by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni in her speech to the General Assembly. Starting, for example, with a management of hotspots in Africa by the United Nations. In the meantime, the government boasts its agenda and in New York it shared with several African leaders the 'Mattei Plan', an equal partnership project for the growth and development of the continent.
All rights reserved © Copyright ANSA
