Cyprus to house EU transit camp for illegal immigrants

ITALY has reached an agreement with Cyprus to build a detention centre on the island as a transit camp for illegal immigrants caught in the Mediterranean, according to Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini.

In an interview with Italy’s Corriere della Sera newspaper published yesterday, Frattini said Italy proposed setting up a maritime control centre for the southeast Mediterranean in Cyprus and “a centre, the size of which has yet to be determined, to house clandestine migrants stopped at sea until they are sent back to their home countries”.

Frattini told the paper that Cyprus had already agreed to the proposal, which has the backing of Britain. The minister added they hoped to open a similar centre in Malta in cooperation with Britain and Spain. Italy is preparing to take over the EU presidency from Greece at the beginning of next month.

Just a few days earlier, EU leaders at the Salonica summit in Greece rejected Britain’s controversial plan to set up “protection zones” outside EU borders that would stem the flow of asylum seekers.

Government spokesman, Kypros Chrysostomides was unavailable for comment yesterday.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.