Italy's migrant rescue mission to be taken over by EU: minister

Italy's rescue mission of boat migrants in the Mediterranean Sea will be taken over by a similar European Union (EU) operation, Italian interior minister Angelino Alfano said on Wednesday.

He made the remarks after a meeting with the EU commissioner for home affairs Cecilia Malmstrom in Brussels.

The EU's border control agency Frontex will step in the patrolling operation Italy has been carrying out in the Mediterranean in the last 10 months, and the new mission will be called "Frontex Plus", both Alfano and Malmstrom explained.

"Today we have reached two solid results: the 'Frontex Plus' mission will absorb and strengthen two existing rescue operations, and it will work as a widen unit patrolling the European borders, " Alfano said.

The second result was an agreement for the EU to hep Italy destroying on land every single vessel used by traffickers to prevent them from being used again, Alfano added.

The Frontex Plus would eventually replace the search and rescue mission dubbed "Mare Nostrum"(Our Sea), which Italy had launched in October 2013 after some 400 migrants died few miles away from the tiny Italian island of Lampedusa when their crafts capsized.

Since then, Italian navy and coast guards have been patrolling waters between Sicily and African coasts to try and save those who undertake the perilous journey towards Europe, in most cases sailing aboard unseaworthy crafts and even inflatable boats.

"The aim is to put in place an enlarged Frontex Plus, in order to complete what Italy has been doing," EU commissioner Malmstrom said. The goal would be to implement the new mission starting from November, she added.

However, Malmstrom said the Frontex Plus mission's strength would depend upon the contributions of EU states, since Frontex agency alone can count on very restricted resources.

Italy's interior minister confirmed it would be up to EU member states to "provide assets, aircrafts and vessels, in order to guard the European borders."

The agreement came after Italian authorities had repeatedly appealed to the EU for more help in dealing with a dramatic increase in the number of people willing to reach Europe to escape wars, humanitarian crisis, and political unrest in the Middle East and in African countries.

Italy's interior minister had recently reiterated the plea to the EU, warning that Italy could not afford to keep going on with the Mare Nostrum mission alone, if not supported in terms of funds and resources.

More than 115,400 migrants have been saved and 271 smugglers arrested with "Mare Nostrum" mission since October, Italian authorities said.

Yet, the journey across the Mediterranean remains extremely unsafe. At least 1,889 people have died on the sea while trying to reach Europe this year, and 1,600 of them since the start of June only, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

More than 300 migrants died in the last week alone, the UNHCR added.