Prodi wil maatregelen in de strijd tegen criminaliteit van Europese migranten opvoeren (en)
Italian prime minister Romano Prodi has suggested the EU should beef up rules tackling criminality by migrants rather than introducing restrictions on the bloc's fundamental principle of free movement of labour.
With a rise in crimes committed by migrants, particularly from Romania, Mr Prodi has admitted that Rome and other national capitals were not fully prepared for all aspects of the bloc's enlargement and immigration.
In an interview with the Financial Times, published on Wednesday (7 November), the centre-left leader suggested that although Italy debates the issue because of the concrete case of a much publicised murder of an Italian woman by a suspected Romanian immigrant, the EU needs "more cooperation in the case of immigration by all European countries."
"What I am asking of the European Union i is to have common rules in order to have repatriation more effective and to be more cooperative in all the side effects of these movements," he added.
As a strong advocate of the bloc's enlargement while chairing the European Commission i in 1999 - 2004, Mr Prodi said "I prefer to have a Europe which is open to free circulation of all the Union citizens and regulate together all the criminal aspects of it."
He argued that the current rules on dealing with the practical implications of the free movement do not "give sufficient stimulus to cooperation" among national governments.
"It is not per se enough for the degree of this phenomenon. We need more active cooperation," Mr Prodi suggested, maintaining that the inflow of migrants seen by Italy is not temporary, given the rising demographic challenges.
It is estimated that around 1,000 Romanian people, mainly of Gypsy origin, have arrived in Italy every month since Romania joined the EU this January. Many of them live in camps close to cities and are thought to be involved in various crimes, such as petty thefts but also robberies and murders.
The public outcry over the most recent case - the murder of a 47-year old woman from Rome by a 25-year-old Romanian - has led to a fast-track adoption of a decree allowing expulsions of EU citizens who pose a threat to public security.
So far, there have been 29 decisions by local authorities with 12 cases convalidated by a judge and six people expelled - among them, 28 Romanians and one Hungarian, according to Italy's prime minister.
But Mr Prodi argued in the FT interview that his government measures were not aimed against Romanians, stressing "it is the destiny of these two countries to have a flow" due to the linguistic similarity of Italian and Romanian.
"This is a problem concerning all foreigners, not just Romanians, although in this moment statistically the Romanians are higher than any other country," he said.
But he admitted that Italy had not anticipated such a large inflow of Romanians after the country joined the EU in January 2007.