Interior Minister Roberto Maroni on Monday promised tougher measures to deal with migrants entering Italy by sea, after hundreds landed on the small island of Lampedusa over the weekend.
Maroni said anyone arriving on the island would no longer be sent to processing centres in other parts of Italy but would instead be returned to their point of departure directly from Lampedusa within a few days.
Discussing the arrival of nearly 2,000 migrants since Christmas in a radio interview, the minister said the current situation was ''an emergency, and as such, requires emergency measures''.
''I have given orders to open a centre on Lampedusa tasked with identifying and expelling arrivals,'' he added. ''The first repatriation flights will get under way by tomorrow or the day after tomorrow by the latest''.
The minister also promised patrols of the Libyan coastline, the point of departure for many African migrants, by the end of January.
Libyan patrols designed to intercept migrant boats were originally part of a December 2007 deal between the Italian and Libyan interior ministries but a series of disagreements since then has blocked the process.
On Monday, Maroni said the areas of contention in the December 2007 deal were being ironed out, while a separate bilateral agreement signed in August would be ratified by parliament shortly.
''I am optimistic,'' the minister said. ''An Italian government delegation is currently in dialogue with the Libyans and I have received assurances from Foreign Minister Franco Frattini that the patrols will get under way in January.
''If, as the Libyans have promised, the patrols start in January then this will mean the end of the landings on Lampedusa,'' he said.
But the minister's comments met with concern among experts and opposition MPs.
The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) warned Maroni to guard against ''mass expulsions'', recalling that ''the rights of asylum seekers must be protected''.
UNHCR's Italian spokesperson Laura Boldrini said: ''It is vital that people are provided with information on their rights and are given the opportunity to lodge asylum requests, even in 'emergency' situations such as the present one''.
ARCI, a left-leaning association involved in charity work, recalled that over 60% of foreigners arriving on Lampedusa are asylum seekers.
''It is obvious that we risk sending people to their death if we expel them during rushed operations without proper safeguards,'' said ARCI immigration director Filippo Miraglia.
The secretary of the Senate European Affairs Committee, Roberto Di Giovan Paolo of the opposition Democratic Party, said Maroni's approach would not resolve the underlying problem.
''If we really want to stop illegal immigration we have to set up extensive cooperation and development accords not just with Libya but with the Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa - in other words, where these people are actually coming from,'' he said.
''Otherwise, all we are doing is moving the problem from one place to another''.
