EU Commissioner for Home Affairs Cecilia Malmström thanked Italy for stepping in and taking “the 102 stranded migrants who were saved to (sic) days ago.”

Ms Malmström also appealed for more EU member states to show solidarity on the migration issue.

“Relocation of asylum seekers is a way to show solidarity in Europe. Would be great if all 28 EU member (sic) would help and not only the same (sic),” Ms Malmström said on twitter.

The EU Commissioner has come in for a torrent of abuse on another social media platform, Facebook. Her official Facebook page has been inundated with offensive comments posted by Maltese commentators – with a number of others posting on the page disassociating themselves from such ‘savage’ comments.

The comments came in the light of the EU’s call for Malta to allow the tanker carrying 102 migrants rescued from a dinghy enter Maltese waters. The Maltese government insisted that it would refuse the tanker entry since the captain had ignored calls from both Maltese and Italian authorities to return to the nearest and safest port, which at the time the migrants were picked up, was Libya. But the captain proceeded towards Malta and stopped 24 nautical miles off Malta’s coast.

In the end, following the Maltese government’s decision to refuse it entry at all costs, Italy accepted the migrants.

The comments told the EC Commissioner to take into consideration Malta’s plight with migrants, with some commentators going overboard with nasty and personal comments which others who wrote on the page condemning their Maltese counterparts for their style.