Spain has enforced border controls on all air and sea travel from Italy as tensions between the two EU nations deepen.
The measures, which came into effect at midnight (22:00 GMT), will remain in place for a month. They follow Italy’s decision last week to introduce similar restrictions after about 78,000 migrants from Morocco entered the Spanish exclave of Ceuta, reports BBC.
On Friday, Madrid demanded that Rome lift its checks by Sunday. Italy, however, insisted the controls would continue until at least 15 August, claiming Spain “expects a new wave of migration” to Ceuta.
The dispute has set Spain’s socialist prime minister Pedro Sanchez against Italy’s conservative leader Giorgia Meloni, who has long advocated stricter EU migration rules.
Italy, which does not share a land border with Spain, said its suspension of the border-free Schengen arrangement was aimed at preventing migrants arriving in Ceuta from travelling onwards to Italy.
Madrid dismissed this reasoning as “spurious arguments” without factual basis, stressing that those entering Ceuta had no means of accessing the Schengen area.
Responding to Spain’s ultimatum, Italy declared it would not accept “ultimatums” and would not reconsider its decision “under any circumstances” until at least mid-August, and only once “security and terrorist risks for Italy have been completely eliminated.”
Italian officials added that local authorities conducting checks were doing “everything possible” to ensure maximum comfort for Spanish and other European citizens arriving from Spain.
