Marco Minniti

Marco Minniti is an Italian politican who acted as Minister of the Interior from December 2016 to March 2018. Marco Minniti has been qualified as the Architect of Italy’s new Libyan policy. Prior to being appointed Minister of Interior, Marco Minniti served as Delegated Authority for the Security of the Republic under Letta’s and Renzi’s governments (May 2013 – December 2016). During his service as Delegated Authority, Minniti led the work of the Security Intelligence System on two main political challenges for the Italian government at the time: the rise of populist, anti-EU and anti-migration movements and the terrorist and foreign fighters threat. According to Minniti, the protection of European’s external frontiers via the establishment of a European Coast Guard and the introduction of a European inter-operability data system were key to ensure the efficiency of the European Agenda on Security. In this context, creating solid relationships with third-countries, including Libya, was crucial to ensure efficient border management and mitigate the above-mentioned threats. Marco Minniti then applied this expertise at the Ministry of Interior, as Minister, where cooperation with third-countries on border management matters became one of the Ministry’s strategic objectives. As soon as he started to lead the Ministry, Marco Minniti made cooperation with Libya on migration management one of his top priorities. Marco Minniti met various times multiple Libyan State representatives as well as mayor of local communities, and rival tribes of the south of Libya to discuss on how they could engage in the fight against irregular migration in exchange of help for building their economy and formalize agreement. His past experience and ministerial responsibilities made him particularly involved in the situation in Libya, recurrently invoking his knowledge and experience over the region. He presented himself as the man who would provide “solutions” to “Europe’s migration crisis”, which was by then perceived to be at its peak, by sealing the border to the South of Europe through the Memorandum of Understanding with Libya hereinafter.

The first official meeting between the new Italian Ministry of Interior and Libyan authorities happened on 9 January 2017 in Tripoli. Minniti had a series of talks with Presidential Council President Falez Mustafa Al Serraj, Foreign Minister M. Siyala and members of the Presidential Council, A. Maitig and A. Kajman in order to start a new phase of cooperation between the two countries, especially with reference to the migration sector, and the supposed fight against criminal organizations that “exploited migrants”. It was reported that during that meeting, Minniti managed to obtain a “draft memorandum of understanding” that would allow Italy to mediate more easily with the rest of Europe. No mention was made that the said exploitation of migrants was perpetrated by the EU itself by maximizing its efforts to keep in and pull back migrants to Libya. The result of these consultations was the Memorandum of Understanding, signed in February 2017. Consequently, Marco Minniti reinforced the international dimension of the Ministry of Interior, and intesified the negotiations with Libyan counterparts on agreements on border management. Under the Minniti's administration, the Minstry of Interior started to delegitimize the work of NGOs conducting SAR operations in the Central Mediterranean. According to a member of the Cabinet of the Ministry of the Interior under Minniti, the Ministry thought that the work of NGOs would jeopardize the efforts to outsource the Search and Rescue responsibility to the Libyan authorities. During Minniti's administration, the Code of Conduct for NGOs was signed. This piece of policy represents a fundamental cornerstone in the history of criminalization of NGOs and it paved the way for the subsequent legal actions launched against NGOs conducting SAR operations. [Italy; Presidency of the Council; Ministry of Interior; Bilateral Efforts - the Memorandum of Understanding between Italy and Libya; The delegitimization of the NGOs and the Code of Conduct]