The case of 177 rescued migrants who were stranded on the Italian coastguard ship Umberto Diociotti for ten days in August during an international standoff, produced no winners, Italy's populist premier Giuseppe said on Thursday
"Everyone lost in the Diciotti case. If Europe wants an immigration policy, this means preparing a strategy, revising the Dublin regulation and rapidly introducing new mechanisms to share the influx of migrants fairly," Conte told a summit of European heads of state and government in the Austrian city of Salzburg.
The Dublin regulation requires refugees to claim asylum in the first country of arrival, often Italy, which is one of the main entry points to Europe.
"The longer we delay, the more problems we will have - the whole of Europe not just Italy, Spain and Greece," Conte went on.
The Diciotti picked up 190 migrants 17 miles off Lampedusa on 14 August. Thirteen of the migrants were taken to the tiny southern Italian island for medical treatment. But the remaining 177 were stuck in international waters for five days after interior minister Matteo Salvini stopped them disembarking in Sicily unless other EU states agreed to take them in.
The migrants spent a further five days aboard the Diciotti at the Sicilian port of Catania before being allowed off when the standoff came to an end after Italy's Catholic Church, Ireland and Albania agreed to shelter most of the migrants.
Conte wrote to the EU Commission in July urging the bloc to set up a "crisis cell" that would mediate with member states on the relocation within the bloc of rescued migrants, a proposal that EU Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker "fully accepted" in a written reply.
Rome also wants changes to the EU Sophia Mission's rules of engagement requiring migrants rescued in the Mediterranean to be disembarked in Italy.
At a fractious 28-29 June summit in Brussels, under pressure from Italy, European leaders controversially agreed to set up secure centres for migrants in the bloc, to tighten its borders, create 'disembarkation platforms' outside the bloc and to relocate refugees among member states.
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