Italy tug zig-zagging along Libya coast - operator, Posted by Meosha Eaton

* Offshore supply vessel heading northwest towards Mellitah

* Pro-Gaddafi military personnel are on board with crew

ROME, March 21 (Reuters) - An Italian tugboat, held for nearly 24 hours in Tripoli, is zig-zagging northwest along the Libyan coast with pro-Gaddafi military personnel on board, its operator said on Monday.

The offshore supply vessel, crewed by 8 Italians, two Indians and a Ukrainian was detained in Libya at around 1600 GMT on Saturday, shortly before French aircraft fired the first shots against forces loyal to Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.

The vessel left Tripoli at around 1300 GMT on Sunday with its crew along with members of Libya's armed forces aboard and its destination was unknown, said a spokesman from Augusta Offshore, operator and manager of the ship. "It left the port (of Tripoli) and it is navigating between Mellitah and Tripoli," the spokesman said.

"We are not quite sure where it is or where it is going. But obviously the Italian foreign ministry is involved in trying to negotiate the release of the ship," he said. "We know Libyan military personnel are on board."

Defence Minister Ignazio La Russa told Italian television that the crew was still aboard the the vessel, which had been engaged for a Libyan client of Italian oil group Eni.

"It's heading west but we don't really know where it's going because it's zig-zagging along and there are armed Libyan soldiers aboard," he told Canale 5 television. (Reporting by Jonathan Saul and James Mackenzie; Editing by Louise Ireland)

Italy call for EU help with refugees rebuffed, Posted by Meosha Eaton

* Italy alarmed by threat of refugees from north Africa
* EU governments say Italian calls for help exaggerated


By Justyna Pawlak

BRUSSELS, Feb 24 (Reuters) - Italy faced criticism in the European Union on Thursday for raising alarm over a potential wave of refugees from Libya, with several governments saying Rome's calls for help in dealing with migrants were exaggerated.
Western governments are weighing contingency plans if escalating violence in Libya triggers massive outflows of people.

But international experts say out of at least 30,000, mainly Tunisians and Egyptians, who have fled turmoil so far, none were headed for Europe. Rome has warned hundreds of thousands could flee to Italy, an important European port of entry for many migrants from north Africa, and asked its European partners for funds and help in housing them.

But many EU governments, mainly from northern Europe, said during a meeting in Brussels it was too early to predict how many people could seek shelter from turmoil in north Africa in Europe, and rebuffed Italy's requests. "We shouldn't paint the devil on the wall until he appears," Hungary's interior minister, Sandor Pinter, told reporters after the meeting. Hungary holds the EU's presidency until the end of June and oversees many policy debates.

Austrian Interior Minister Maria Fekter said Vienna was ready to help if turmoil led to a humanitarian disaster, but this was not the case yet. "We are against reallocating asylum seekers from Italy to the rest of Europe," she said before meeting. The rift underscores divisions in Europe on how to tackle immigration and share responsibility for housing refugees, asylum seekers and irregular immigrants to the bloc.


Under EU rules, asylum seekers can only apply for assistance in the country in which they first entered the EU. In case of a humanitarian disaster outside EU borders, the bloc's governments are not obliged to take in refugees who arrive in another state.
German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said Berlin had done a share of caring for massive flows of refugees when it sheltered thousands that fled Balkan wars in the 1990s. He said Italy was "challenged but not overstretched" by more than 5,000 people that have arrived on the Italian island of Lampedusa in recent weeks, fleeing unrest in Tunisia. "We have lived up to our humanitarian responsibility," he said. "We shouldn't be painting horror figuresand encouraging refugees to come to Europe."


The EU's border agency sent teams of officials in recent days to Italy to deal with migrants from Tunisia. But Italy wants a promise that more help would be available.
Its worry is that many of the hundreds of thousands of migrants from Asia and other parts of Africa now living in Libya could seek shelter in Italy. "We ask for solidarity of other member states ... We cannot be left alone," Italian Interior Minister Roberto Maroni said.

(Additional reporting by Francesco Guarascio; Reporting by Justyna Pawlak; Editing by Alison Williams)