Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni’s government has vowed to open controversial migrant processing centers in Albania that have remained dormant after Italian courts refused to validate the transfer of the first two groups of migrants.

Italy's government pledged on Monday to push ahead with a contested plan to detain asylum seekers in centres built in Albania and said it would work with allies on "innovative" ideas to curb flows of irregular migrants into Europe.

Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini was found not guilty in a criminal kidnapping case dating back to August 2019, when he barred a migrant vessel from docking in the country, leaving it stranded offshore.

"It's about our democracy, it's about influencing our public opinion, it's about what happens in Africa, it's about raw materials, it's about the instrumentalization of migration. We need to know it's a very wide idea of security,