Macron, Meloni meet in Rome amid tensions over migration
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni held talks Tuesday with French President Emmanuel Macron in Rome, as tensions between the two countries persist over the issue of migration.
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The French leader was in the Italian capital to attend the state funeral of former President Giorgio Napolitano, who died on Friday aged 98.
After the ceremony, Emmanuel Macron and Giorgia Meloni had a "long and friendly meeting", the Italian premier's office said in a statement.
They paid "particular attention to the management of the migration phenomenon and European economic priorities" ahead of forthcoming European meetings.
The two leaders last met in Paris in June, and are also both due at the "Med 9" summit of southern EU nations in Malta on Friday.
Macron's office confirmed they discussed "the need to find a European solution to the migration question", as well as economic issues.
A sharp rise in migrant landings to the Italian island of Lampedusa earlier this month reignited a bitter debate across the EU over who takes responsibility for asylum seekers.
Interior minister Gerald Darmanin declared that France would not welcome any migrants coming from Lampedusa, after 8,500 people landed on the island in just three days.
There was also a diplomatic spat last November, when Meloni's newly-elected government refused to allow a migrant rescue ship to dock in Italy.
Paris eventually allowed the Ocean Viking ship into a French port, but denounced Rome's "unacceptable" behaviour and suspended plans to receive 3,500 migrants from Italy.
In recent days, both Paris and Rome have sought to ease tensions.
"We cannot leave the Italians alone," Macron said in a television interview on Sunday - an offer of help that Meloni immediately said she "welcomed with great interest".
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Meloni has also clashed over migration with Germany, whose president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, was also among those at Napolitano's funeral.
The Italian premier wrote to Chancellor Olaf Scholz at the weekend to complain about Berlin's funding of charity projects to help migrants either at sea or onshore in Italy.
Rome blames the NGO boats that conduct rescue missions in the central Mediterranean for encouraging arrivals from North Africa.
But data shows they do not work as a so-called pull factor, departures are based on the weather not the presence of NGO boats, and the vast majority of migrants are rescued by the Italian coastguard, according to the interior ministry.
(with AFP)
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