Valletta - Malta on Tuesday denied claims that it had diverted 40,000 would-be illegal immigrants to Italy in recent years.

Italian Interior Minister Roberto Maroni presented a dossier to the European Commission on Tuesday in the wake of Malta's refusal to accept refugees from a Turkish vessel.

More than 140 immigrants were left stranded off Lampedusa for three days at the end of last week, after the rescue vessel Pinar was refused entry by both Italy and Malta.

The Italian authorities insisted that the immigrants should be taken to Malta, which is responsible for search and rescue operations in the region.

Malta maintained, however, that in terms of international conventions it had signed, the immigrants had to be landed at the nearest safe port, in this case Lampedusa.

Diplomatic relations between the two traditionally close countries took a further blow Tuesday after Maroni claimed that the Maltese rescue centre had "failed to intervene" 600 times on matters concerning immigrants at sea. Only last month, a vessel with 76 immigrants on board was refused entry into Valletta, the dossier says.

But Maltese Home Affairs Minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici insisted Malta is not sending illegal immigrants to Italy.

"Maroni can prepare as many dossiers as he likes. We are small and it's very easy to perform an audit of what we've done. But other larger countries should be subject to the same audits that we are subjected to.

If there is anyone who expects Malta to take illegal immigrants that are his responsibility, he can forget it. The facts prove that Malta was right all along," the minister said.

Those fleeing Africa are leaving from Libya and their final destination is always Italy, and not Malta, he added.

Mifsud Bonnici reminded Italy that ships have the right of free passage on the high seas, irrelevant of which country is responsible for the search and rescue area.

"There were no cases of boats coming to Malta and then proceeding onto Italy. The boats use this right of innocent passage, and proceed to Lampedusa, Malta or directly to Sicily. The Maltese government has no authority to stop them from doing this. International maritime laws forbid this."

Mifsud Bonnici said Malta had adopted the same practice for the past 45 years. Malta was involved in 380 operations in the past year and the number of would-be illegal immigrants arriving in a year almost doubled.

The minister cited European Commissioner for Justice Jacques Barrot who said that international obligations stipulate that rescued persons are to be taken to the closest port of call, and in the case of the Pinar the closest port of call was Lampedusa.

"Lampedusa has been a safe port for decades. One asks why this should no longer be the case, and why an (Italian) military ship was sent to track the vessel and stop it from proceeding to Lampedusa," the minister said.

During a visit to the Mediterranean island on Tuesday, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon said he was not in a position to intervene in the issue on the destination of rescued migrants, saying the matter is being resolved "amicably" between the two countries. (dpa)