Facilities on a tiny Italian island risk "collapse" following the arrival overnight of 500 would-be immigrants, officials said Thursday.
At least another 250 would-be immigrants were sighted drifting in a 12 metre-long boat some 24 nautical miles south of Lampedusa and a rescue operation to bring them to the island was underway, an Italian navy official said.
The overnight arrivals on Lampedusa, which lies between Sicily and the North African coast, took place on four separate vessels which were either intercepted by Italian coast guard patrols or sighted by trawlers who then alerted authorities.
The groups, including at least 50 women and an unspecified number of children, were "in reasonable good health," Italian navy official Francesco Galipo told television news channel SKY TG24.
Last Saturday Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's government announced a nationwide state of emergency in reaction to a stark increase in illegal immigration to the country's south.
According to the interior ministry, over 10,600 boat people arrived in Italy in the first half of 2008, nearly twice as many as the 5,378 that came in the same period in 2007.
The state of emergency measures provide local authorities with greater means to deal with the rising tide of would-be immigrants arriving by boat.
Some of the measures had already been in place in three southern regions of Calabria, Sicily and Puglia, but Berlusconi's conservative government, which was elected in April on a platform including a promise to curb illegal immigration, widened the powers to the entire country.
Since taking office the government's immigration policies, including the introduction of harsher penalties for crimes committed by illegal immigrants, have come under European Union scrutiny, while Italy's centre-left opposition has branded them "discriminatory."
The number of illegal immigrants in Italy is estimated at around 650,000. Tens of thousands of refugees attempt the dangerous journey in less-than-seaworthy boats from North Africa into southern Europe each year.
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