Italy calls for 'closing' Schengen zone to Spain

ROME: Italy's Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani on Thursday called for Spain to be suspended from the Schengen zone after hundreds of migrants entered its exclave of Ceuta from Morocco.

The Schengen Area is a system of open borders that encompass 29 European countries that have officially abolished frontier controls at their common borders.

"I am in favour of closing the Schengen area with Spain," he wrote on X. 

"Irregular and uncontrolled immigration poses a danger to national security.

"The images coming from Ceuta show how the Madrid Government's decision to grant Spanish, and therefore European, citizenship to over 500,000 irregular immigrants is profoundly wrong and encourages human trafficking," he added.

Matteo Salvini, also Italy's deputy prime minister and leader of the far-right League party, has in turn called for the Schengen zone to be suspended and Europe's borders defended.