The Italian government plans to impose fines of up to 10,000 euros on aircraft pilots who search for migrant boats, according to a draft government decree.

The Georgia Meloni government has pledged to block arrivals of illegal immigrants. In this context, it is working with governments of African countries to put a stop to migrant boat departures to Italy. Immigration detention centers will also be set up in Albania, which will soon be operational.

This migration policy has made it increasingly difficult for NGOs to facilitate the crossing of illegal immigrants with their ships. Rome has limited the number of such operations, grounding these ships in ports and often forcing them to make huge detours to bring illegal immigrants ashore.

According to the decree, aircraft that “depart or land in Italy and carry out activity… for the purpose of search and rescue” must immediately inform the authorities of any emergency and comply with their orders.

Failure to comply with these orders can result in the aircraft being grounded for 20 days and, in the case of repeated violations, confiscation.

The decree follows a new illegal immigration crackdown in May, when the Meloni government banned planes used by NGOs to track ships from using airports near shipping lanes. The NGOs reacted with anger and some ignored the measure.

The new decree also provides for stricter measures against fraud in the visa system for immigrants. Meloni denounces the fraud as proof that criminal organizations have infiltrated the system to grant visas to those who have no right to receive them.

The decree stresses that employers who in the last three years applied to hire a foreign worker but were not approved will not be allowed to reapply.

Italy last year increased its work visa quotas for non-EU citizens to a total of 452,000 for the period 2023-2025, an increase of nearly 150% over the previous three years.

In 2019, before the Covid pandemic, Italy issued just 30,850 visas.