Nearly 300 rescued migrants reach southern Italian port of Melilla | Reuters
When Italy’s populist government, led by Matteo Renzi, finally took office in a historic general election in June last year, it vowed to welcome thousands of migrants to the country – many from Africa and Asia – in an effort to reduce a record-high immigrant population. Italy and other European nations, however, worried that the influx would overwhelm the country’s already heavily strained system, especially its notoriously bureaucratic immigration authorities.
Italy’s populist government, led by Matteo Renzi, finally took office in a historic general election in June last year.
At the time, Italy said it would welcome some 900,000 migrants on a one-year pilot program. In reality, however, the government’s promises were too ambitious. It said 1 million migrants would arrive, but a few months later the government was forced to abandon the project.
In the face of such huge hurdles, migrants made their way through the narrow, narrow streets of the port city of Melilla to finally reach Italy’s rescue boats.
Since then, the migrant crisis in the Mediterranean has continued. In the first quarter of 2018, more than one million people made the journey from North Africa to Europe, while in the same period, around 400,000 people have arrived on the migrant boats that make the trans-Atlantic journey every year.
In the middle of this migration, which is threatening to overwhelm Europe’s fragile health and social systems, Europe’s migration crisis has become one of its biggest challenges, as the migrant “caravans” travel on from Libya to southern Europe, and back again, at high and dangerous rates.
This week, around 2,700 migrants and migrants and refugees reached the port of Fattouma.
One of the most difficult parts of the journey is in the Mediterranean Sea, and this week, around 2,700 migrants and migrants and refugees reached the port of Fattouma. This was the biggest group ever seen, and many people had to spend a night