Fidesz MEP: PfE group expresses solidarity with Salvini

Gal said it was “unacceptable” that “decision-makers protecting their own countries and citizens, and Europe’s external borders, are threatened with prison”. Border protection is a duty, “Schengen doesn’t work without it”, she said.

Gal, who also heads the Fidesz MEP group, told a press conference on the sidelines of the EP plenary that Brussels and the European Commission should support border protection “in principle and in material support”. She called on the EC to support all political forces protecting country borders and so European citizens.

PfE had proposed including Salvini’s case in the EP plenary’s agenda, but the EP rejected it “as an incredible and outrageous request”, she said.

“Borders must be protected, and the ships of NGOs must be monitored and their operations limited,” Gal said. “The only way to return to common sense is to scrap the flawed migration pact and declare the protection of external borders a priority,” she said.

Then-Interior Minister Salvini turned away Open Arms, a Spanish vessel operated by an NGO carrying 147 people, from the port of Lampedusa in August 2019. The ship was forced to wait in open waters for 19 days, when the prosecutor’s office in Agrigento, Sicily, allowed the passengers to come to shore. A year later, the Italian parliament lifted Salvini’s immunity in the procedure where he had been accused of hostage-taking, abuse of power, violation of international conventions, and other crimes.

Salvini said on Facebook he was proud to have been protecting Italy’s borders and would do so again if necessary.

A ruling in the case is expected in October.