Spain has imposed border controls on all air and sea travel from Italy as a row between the two EU countries intensifies.
The measures – which started at midnight (22:00 GMT) and will last for a month – come a week after Italy introduced similar restrictions following an influx of about 78,000 migrants from Morocco into the Spanish exclave of Ceuta.
On Friday, Spain demanded Italy reverse its checks by Sunday. Rome said they would stay until at least 15 August – when, it said, Spain “expects a new wave of migration” to hit Ceuta.
The crisis has pitted Spain’s socialist leader Pedro Sanchez against Italy’s conservative leader Giorgia Meloni – who has long called for stricter EU migration rules.
Italy does not share a land border with Spain. Its government said last week that decision to temporarily suspend the border-free Schengen arrangement was to prevent any of the migrants who had entered Ceuta from travelling on to Italy.
