(ANSA) Premier Giorgia Meloni on Wednesday criticized the decision by medical officials to allow around 250 people who were on board two NGO-run search-and-rescue ships to disembark in Catania on Tuesday on health grounds.
The ships, the Humanity 1 and the Geo Barents, docked in the Sicilian city at the weekend but the government initially only allowed people considered vulnerable to land and had told the ships to return to international waters with the others still on board.
“I read some surreal headlines that were a long way from the truth in the newspapers this morning,” Meloni told a meeting of lawmakers for her right-wing Brothers of Italy (FdI) party.
