Italy's foreign minister Luigi Di Maio was on Tuesday due to hold talks with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov as part of government efforts to secure the release of 18 fishermen detained off eastern Libya earlier this month, foreign ministry sources said.
Di Maio held talks with United Arab Emirates foreign minister Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan on Monday as part of the government's bid to free the fishermen and their two vessels.
The incident dates back to 1 September, when two Sicilian fishing boats, Antartide and Medinea, were approached by Libyan patrol boats some 12 miles off Benghazi. Officials accused the crews of fishing in Libyan territorial waters, seized the boats and transferred the vessels and their crews to Benghazi.
Warlord Khalifa Haftar, whose forces hold sway in Libya's east, is reportedly refusing to release the Italian fishermen and their two boats until Italy frees four Libyan footballers who were arrested in Sicily in 2015 and jailed for 30 years on human trafficking charges.
