Support being given to the Libyan coastguard is helping fight people trafficking from Africa to Europe, Italy's hardline interior minister Matteo Salvini said Monday after nearly 400 migrants were intercepted and returned to Libya.
The 393 migrants rescued by Libya's coastguard in the Mediterranean on Sunday were all "safe and sound", Salvini tweeted.
"The cooperation is working, the human traffickers and mafia organisations need to realise that their business is over," the tweet continued.
The populist Italian government has no plan to change its policy of training and equipping Libyan coastguard, the tweet said.
"Fewer crossings and fewer deaths," Salvini underlined.