Salvini calls on Slovenia to resume readmissions

(ANSA) - ROME, APR 11 - Deputy Premier and Transport and Infrastructure Minister Matteo Salvini said Tuesday that Italy's northeastern neighbour Slovenia should resume the readmission of migrants found to have crossed the border illegally or the country would be obliged to reinstall border checkpoints.
    "We need to reason with Slovenia so that it does what it has to do and what it did in the past," said Salvini of the readmissions procedure provided for under a bilateral agreement dating to the mid 1990s and which a Rome court ruled in January 2021 to be illegitimate.
    "Otherwise we will be forced to reinstall border checkpoints, which is not my or our priority, but it is not possible to be left alone, in Trieste, in Lampedusa, in Ventimiglia, in Cutro.
    Everyone has to play their part," continued the minister and leader of the right-wing League.
    Italy's northeast border with Slovenia is the main crossing point into the country for migrants and refugees transiting along the Balkan Route from Turkey to northern Europe. (ANSA).