© MSF
Migrants onboard an Italian coastguard ship following transfer from French NGO's ship Aquarius.
Italy postponed high-level talks with France on Wednesday after Paris branded Rome irresponsible for refusing to take in a migrant rescue ship.
Italy's new economy minister postponed a meeting with his French counterpart in Paris as their
countries traded barbs over the treatment of more than 600 migrants rescued off the Libyan coast at the weekend.
The migrants were stranded on the Aquarius vessel until Spain said the ship could land at its port of Valencia. It is expected to arrive there later this week.
French President Emmanuel Macron accused Italy's new populist government of
"cynicism and irresponsibility" for closing its ports to the 629 migrants.
Rome called his comments "unacceptable" and summoned France's ambassador on Wednesday. "Such statements are undermining relations between Italy and France," Italy's foreign ministry said in a statement.
Macron later appealed for the two sides
not to "give in to emotions that certain people are manipulating". In a speech in the western French town of Mouchamps, he insisted that France was "working hand in hand with Italy" to handle migration.
Comment: What's worse is that - between the proposed legislation mentioned in Canada (boy, they're up to their eyeballs in leftist law-making aren't they?) and the mass destabilization that the influx of refugees is causing - Islamophobia is increasing in places it likely never existed before.