Over 800 illegal migrants have landed on the Southern Italian coast over the last two days, sparking fears of a fresh immigration crisis.
Coastguards believe warm weather and calm seas have encouraged the latest influx of men, women and children travelling from North Africa to Sicily and Sardinia in small boats.
On Sunday police intercepted seven boats carrying a total of almost 400 people off the southern Sicilian island of Lampedusa, while 94 Algerians arrived in several crafts on the southern coast of Sardinia.
On Monday, a further seven boats containing 326 people were intercepted off Lampedusa, whose temporary detention centre has room for only 600 people.
''If a solution isn't found soon, the island's centre is going to explode,'' said Lampedusa's deputy mayor Angela Maraventano, after the first four boats arrived within two hours on Monday.
Lampedusa's economy relies largely on the tourist industry, but Maraventano said that tourism on the island was ''dying'' while the economy was nearing collapse because of the migrant phenomenon.
Immigration emergencies regularly explode on the small island, which is closer to the coast of Tunisia than to the Italian mainland.
In 2006, over 97% of the migrants illegally travelling to Italy landed in Sicily and on Lampedusa, according to government statistics.
The number of would-be immigrants landing on the island has increased dramatically in recent years, with 23,000 arriving in 2005 compared to 13,000 in 2004.
Maraventano called for the immediate approval of controversial government measures aimed at cracking down on illegal immigration currently being discussed in parliament.
''This decree means so much to us, because it gives us hope, a ray of light,'' she said.
''For me, a Lampedusan, and for our country, it will be a day to remember,'' she said, referring to the decree.
The deputy mayor also urged Premier Silvio Berlusconi to discuss ways of stemming illegal immigration through Libya when he meets Libyan leader Muammar Gadaffi later this month. One of the main routes for would-be immigrants is through the desert from central Africa, into Libya and up to ports on the northern coast, where they pay organised crime groups to ferry them across to Italy.
Many of them risk their lives by making the crossing in small, rickety boats.
Earlier this month at least 40 people drowned and another 100 went missing when a boat taking would-be migrants capsized on its way to Italy from Libya.
At least 2,000 people die every year as they attempt to cross the Mediterranean, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
''The prime minister needs to make a serious agreement with Gadaffi to save these poor people,'' Maraventano said.
The government's emergency security decree includes measures increasing prison sentences when crimes are committed by illegal immigrants, expelling foreigners who receive sentences of two years, and fast-tracking crimes that cause social alarm to trial.
In a law and order bill, the government is also planning to push through more sensitive issues such as making illegal immigration a jailable offence, granting mayors greater powers to deal with immigrants and cracking down on marriages arranged for immigration purposes.
