Italian populist League leader Matteo Salvini has called for the country’s next Interior Minister to be a member of his party, citing the successes he had tackling illegal immigration when he had the job.
The League (Lega) leader, who served as Italy’s Interior Minister in 2018 and 2019, visited the island of Lampedusa earlier this week, which has been inundated and overwhelmed by illegal migrant arrivals in recent months.
Salvini stated that he wanted to close migrant reception centres and, instead, create centres abroad in North Africa to process asylum claims — similar to a policy championed by the British government through its deal with Rwanda that was finalised earlier this year.
While Salvini did not state outright that he wanted to return as interior Minister after national elections on September 25th, he did say that he would like a member of his party to assume the role.