Italian cabinet approves the so-called ‘Salvini Decree’
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The Italian government strengthened its clampdown on irregular immigration with a decree aimed at slashing the number of people awarded asylum and doubling the time irregular migrants can be detained.
The approval came after a cabinet meeting where the ‘Decreto Salvini’ was approved.
This morning the Minister of the Interior had announced – through the social media – the important appointment at Palazzo Chigi: “Good week friends, we start.” Finally today in the council of ministers I bring the security decree, a big step forward in the fight against mafiosi, delinquents and smugglers, the more they attack me, the more they give me strength “. Salvini – during the participation in an electoral event last night in Friuli – explained: “the security and immigration decree is ready” where we put some rules of the right ones “. And he added: “I already know that in some environments the stomach ache will start because we are going to cut a bit of money that people took home with illegal immigration”, specifying that there will be in any case.
The Salvini Decree aims to limit the use of a form of international protection that has been widely used in recent years but is not strictly tied to political persecution or war.
The decree would also widen the range of criminal offences that trigger the stripping of asylum privileges applied for or already granted.
The new immigration guidelines were packaged together with new security rules in an emergency decree, which has 60 days to secure parliamentary approval. Salvini said parliament was likely to make changes. The security measures include heightened controls on those who rent trucks, in response to a series of attacks in Europe aimed at causing mass casualties. It also foresees stripping naturalised foreigners who are convicted on terrorism charges of their Italian citizenship.
The head of the Italian Catholic bishops’ conference, Nunzio Galantino, on Sunday criticised the decision to link immigration and security in the same piece of legislation, saying:
“We cannot consider the immigrant’s condition to be automatically that of a criminal.”
