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Italy Says Undocumented Immigrant Entries Plummet, But Trend Overshadowed by Rights Violations

Posted August 11, 2010 by Leslie Josephs

Just over a year before Arizona’s controversial immigration law SB 1070 went into effect, Italy adopted a harsh law of its own that drew criticism from the European Commission, United Nations, and thousands of immigrants and rights activists. Now, the Italian government is touting results.

In an attempt to curb immigration from eastern and southern Europe, and Africa, in 2009, Italy’s Parliament passed a law that allows immigration officials to detain undocumented migrants for up to six months and slaps the immigrants with a fine of up to 10,000 euros.

This week, Italy’s Foreign Ministry was quoted by Italian news agency ANSA that the number of undocumented immigrants between August 1, 2009, and July 31, 2010, fell 88 percent, to 3,499 undocumented migrants arriving at the country’s doorstep compared with 29, 076 in the year-earlier period.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has long questioned and pressured Italy to clear up cases of possible human rights violations, including that the Italian navy allegedly using force to stuff undocumented immigrants on a ship back to Libya from Italy’s southern desert island of Lampedusa in early July last year. The 82 immigrants were mostly Eritrean.

The law that went into effect last July had been coupled with previously enacted policy of at-sea interceptions of boats carrying immigrants, mostly in the waters between Italy and Africa. Italy’s harsh policy of turning away immigrants has drawn the attention of immigrant and human rights groups and the immigrant workers themselves, who are estimated to total close to 4 million in the country.

In the southern Italian town of Rosarno in January, race riots erupted between African immigrants, mostly agricultural workers, and police and some local residents. Over one thousand immigrants were sent to detention centers, where they would likely be sent back to their countries of origin, if they lacked proper paperwork.

In an April 29 article in Foreign Policy magazine, Peter Williams listed Italy’s new immigration law as one of the “world’s worst.”


Image courtesy of Antonelle Mangano via Flickr.

Tags : immigration in italy, italy, rosarno

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