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Alessandro Metz, from the NGO Mediterranea, during a press conference in Rome on 3 July 2019. Tiziana FABI / AFP

A week after Sea-Watch 3 , a migrant rescue boat on Thursday (July 4th) set sail for the island of Lampedusa to disembark the survivors, defying the ban on Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini.

With our correspondent in Rome, Anne Le Nir

Will we see a new arm between Matteo Salvini and a migrant rescue NGO? Returning to the sea for several days with an 18 meter long sailboat, the Italian NGO Mediterranea rescued 54 people this Thursday, including three pregnant women and four babies, off the coast of Libya.

" The 54 survivors have all been saved and are now on board. Among them, 11 women (three pregnant) and 4 children ... ", wrote in a tweet the NGO.

The crew contacted the headquarters of the Italian Coast Guard to inform them of its rescue operation. But the captain refused to leave the migrants in the hands of the Libyan coastguards as he was asked. Instead, Alex decided to head to the Sicilian island of Lampedusa.

Already somewhat irritated by the decision of the judge who released Sea-Watch Commander 3 , Carola Rackete, Interior Minister Matteo Salvini said that the migrants must be landed " in a Tunisian port ". Tunisia being closer than Lampedusa ", and that if the NGO stubborn, it would implement" all the procedures to prevent the arrival of the boat in an Italian port ". But Salvini is not immune to a new snub.

According to public television Rai, 55 other migrants at risk off Lampedusa were recovered late Thursday night by stars of the customs police and the Italian coastguard, and landed in the port of the small Sicilian island.