Spain checks 200 arrivals from Italy as migration tensions rise

Spain checked around 200 travellers arriving from Italy at the country's six largest airports on the first day of border controls reintroduced following a dispute with Italy over irregular migration.

Spain's Interior Ministry carried out checks on a total of 199 people on 12 flights from Italy to airports in Madrid, Barcelona, Seville, Bilbao, Alicante and Valencia, it said late on Saturday.

Spain said on Friday border controls for flights and ships from Italy would remain in force until September 7 after Rome applied its own measures, which it said were motivated by the mass migration rush by 72,000 people to Spain's North African enclave of Ceuta on July 30.

Italy has suspended the European Union's border-free Schengen arrangements with Spain since August 1 and said it would maintain border controls until at least August 15.

Rome said the measure would not affect Spanish or other EU citizens travelling to Italy and would instead involve targeted checks on non-EU nationals arriving from Spain by air or sea.

"We hope to be able to lift the suspension soon, as soon as there is no longer any risk," Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani told Italian daily Corriere della Sera in an interview published on Sunday.

The Schengen Area allows passport-free travel across 29 European countries, although member states can temporarily reintroduce border controls on security or public-order grounds.

-Reporting by Sara Rossi and Graham Keeley, editing by Sharon Singleton/Reuters