2024. October 14. – 20:14
In Italy, the first group of migrants left for the camps set up in Albania, the International Migration Movement announced on Monday based on information from the Ministry of the Interior in Rome.
The Italian Navy ship Libra will transport the first group to the camps that opened in Albania on Friday. The ship departed Lampedusa for the port of Shengjin. The group consists exclusively of men from countries declared safe by the Italian authorities, including Egyptian and Bangladeshi nationals, all of whom arrived in recent days on the migration route across the Mediterranean. The statement said that women, children and patients who came with the men remained in Lampedusa, but family members were not separated from each other.
Upon their arrival in Shengjin, the men are placed in the camp set up by Italy, where they can also register their application for international protection. In the camp located on the territory of Albania, but under Italian jurisdiction, the legal procedure practiced on the territory of Italy is in force, namely the detention of persons present in the camp, which functions as a border station and registration point (hotspot), by order of the Romanian Immigration Police, which must Confirmed by the competent Romanian court within forty-eight hours. Asylum applications take at least four weeks to process.
From Shengjin, people are transferred to nearby Gadir, where those eligible for asylum are separated from those who will be deported. Eight hundred places were provided for the former and four hundred for the latter. A prison with a capacity of twenty people was also built in Gadir. The camps set up in Shenzhen and Gadir are closed centers, and people cannot leave them.
The two camps can accommodate three thousand people at one time, which, according to Italian calculations, means 39 thousand migrants every year. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said the purpose of the camps was also to limit departures. “This is the first agreement of its kind, and for this reason it has historical importance for Italy and the entire European Union,” he explained after the agreement. Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama said about the same: “Albania has responded to Italy’s call.” Rama added that Albania is not a member of the European Union, but it still considers itself part of Europe and looks at common problems with European eyes.
In Albania, some people like the Italo-Albanian agreement on accepting asylum seekers so much that a special restaurant recently opened not far from the camps: the new place of catering tycoon Girgi Luca, who is close to Edi Rama, is called Trattoria Meloni, and the walls are decorated with photos of Giorgia Meloni .
