Starmer and Meloni hold talks on restricting migrant boats reaching UK and Italy

ROME (AP) — British Prime Minister Keir Starmer will meet Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni in Rome on Monday, as the two very different politicians, from left and right, pursue a common cause to curb migrants reaching their shores by boat. The visit comes after at least eight migrants died at sea off the French coast this weekend.

Support for Ukraine is also on the agenda of the trip, part of Starmer’s bid to mend ties with European neighbours after Britain’s painful departure from the European Union in 2020.

The centre-left Labour prime minister is not a natural ally for Meloni, who leads the far-right Brothers of Italy party. But migration is high on Britain’s political agenda and Starmer hopes Italy’s tough approach will help him stop people fleeing war and poverty trying to cross the English Channel in rickety, overcrowded boats.

More than 22,000 migrants have already made the dangerous crossing from France this year, a slight increase compared to the same period in 2023.

Dozens of people have died trying, including eight who died when a boat carrying about 60 people ran aground on rocks on Saturday night. That same day, 14 boats carrying 801 migrants reached Britain.

Starmer promised “a new era of international enforcement to dismantle these networks, protect our shores and restore order to the asylum system.”

“No more gimmicks,” he said before his trip to Rome – a reference to the previous Conservative government’s failed plan to send some asylum seekers on a one-way trip to Rwanda.

Meloni pledged a tough approach to migration when she took office in 2022, aiming to stop potential refugees from paying smugglers to make the perilous Mediterranean crossing to Italy. Her nationalist conservative government has struck deals with individual African countries to block departures, imposed restrictions on the work of humanitarian rescue ships, cracked down on smugglers and taken measures to deter people from leaving.

Italy has also signed an agreement with Albania, which states that adult male migrants rescued at sea while trying to reach Italy will instead be transferred to Albania while their asylum applications are processed.

According to the country’s Interior Ministry, the number of migrants arriving in Italy by boat in the first half of this year has fallen by 60% compared to 2023.

Starmer is keen to learn from Italy’s combination of tough enforcement and international cooperation. However, Italy’s approach has been criticised by refugee groups and others concerned about Europe’s increasingly strict asylum rules, growing xenophobia and hostile treatment of migrants.

Italy’s right-wing Lega leader Matteo Salvini, who is deputy prime minister in Meloni’s government, is accused by prosecutors of alleged kidnapping over his decision to prevent a rescue ship carrying more than 100 migrants from arriving in Italy when he was interior minister in 2019.

British Home Secretary Yvette Cooper defended the government’s decision to seek advice from Italy’s right-wing government, saying: “We have a history of working with governments with different political parties that are not aligned.”

She said the UK is interested in Italy’s experience in fighting organised crime, and in agreements with countries such as Tunisia to stop the journey of migrants before they reach the sea, and the agreement with Albania.

“I don’t think it’s immoral to tackle criminal gangs,” Cooper told the BBC. “On the contrary. I think it’s a moral imperative to make sure we tackle criminal gangs that are putting lives at risk.”

Starmer visited Italy’s National Coordination Centre for Immigration in Rome with recently appointed UK Border Security Commander Martin Hewitt. The government says Hewitt, a former head of Britain’s National Police Chiefs’ Council, will work with law enforcement and intelligence agencies in the UK and across Europe to tackle people-smuggling networks.

Shortly after being elected in July, Starmer scrapped the Conservatives’ controversial plan to send asylum seekers crossing the Channel to Rwanda, some 4,000 miles away, leaving them with no chance of returning to the UK even if their asylum claims were successful.

The Conservatives said the deportation plan would act as a deterrent, but refugee and human rights groups have called it unethical, judges have ruled it illegal and Starmer has dismissed it as an expensive gimmick. However, he has expressed interest in striking deals like Italy’s with Albania, which would see asylum seekers sent to another country temporarily.

The trip to Rome follows visits to Paris, Berlin and Dublin in Starmer’s first weeks in office — all part of efforts to mend ties with EU neighbours that have been torn by Brexit. Starmer has ruled out rejoining the now 27-nation bloc, but has called for a closer relationship on security and other issues.

Ukraine will also play a role in its talks with the Italian government, which this year holds the presidency of the G7, the world’s largest industrialized countries.

Unlike some politicians on the European right, Meloni is a fervent supporter of Ukraine. Starmer is meeting her after returning from Washington, where he and US President Joe Biden discussed Ukraine’s request to use Western-supplied missiles to strike targets deep inside Russia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has pressured allies to allow his forces to use Western weapons to attack air bases and launch pads in Russia, as Moscow steps up attacks on Ukraine’s power grid and utilities ahead of the winter. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said it would mean NATO countries are “at war with Russia.”

So far, the US has not announced any change in its policy of only allowing Kiev to use US weapons in a limited area within Russia’s border with Ukraine.

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