AN image posted online supposedly showing thousands of people leaving Libya has been exposed as a hoax that was actually taken at a Pink Floyd gig.

The picture was captioned in Italian: “Libyan port... They will never let you see these images... they are ready to sail to Italy.”

5 The original tweet was shared more than 9,000 times Credit: Facebook

It shows masses of boats filled with people - but they're not trying to reach Italy, they’re already there.

In reality, the photo was taken during a Pink Floyd concert in the Italian city of Venice on July 15, 1989.

The image even shows the huge floating stage the band played on while spectators are crammed into the boats near San Marco square.

The post picked up more than nine million shares before it was removed.

5 A Red Cross worker looks towards a minor after disembarking from the Italian Coast Guard vessel Diciotti Credit: AFP or licensors AFP or licensors

Writing in Italian, Elena Guarascio posted: “Ahahaha…. Let’s be quiet, these people will self-extinguish soon, drowned in their own imbecility. #pinkfloyd #fake news #5stelle #cambiamentodistacippa Poor.”

"Andreone" wrote in Italian: “Tell me how to confuse the legendary concert of Pink Floyd in Venice 30 years ago with Libyan migrants ready to invade Italy.

“It will be a matter of ignorance in the sense that you ignore the desire to know certain things?!”

Also writing in Italian, Ettore Cappetti said they were "increasingly disgusted by these thugs of the web", branding people who share fake news "Real criminals".

5 There has been a fierce backlash on social media over the original post Credit: Twitter

The number of migrants arriving in Italy since the peak in 2015 has fallen by 96 per cent, according to Frontex, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency.

An estimated 600,000 refugees have landed in Italy in the past few years.

So far this year more than 1,000 people have drowned at sea trying to make the perilous journey to Europe.

More than 200 migrants are said to have drowned in the past four days alone.

5 Italy's Interior Minister Matteo Salvini has taken a hard line on migrants Credit: Reuters

The figures come after Italy’s new populist government has taken a tougher line on allowing refugees to land at Italian ports and immigration in general.

Interior Minister Matteo Salvini recently said: “The aim is to protect the external border, not to share the problem among European countries but to solve the problem at the source.

“If anyone in the EU thinks Italy should keep being a landing point and refugee camp, they have misunderstood.”

At the recent EU summit at the end of last month a fragile arrangement was put in place.

The aim is to establish secure centres for migrants in EU states, on a voluntary basis, to process asylum claims with those being rejected being “returned”.

The EU also considered establishing “regional disembarkation platforms” in places like North Africa in an attempt to smash the people-smuggling gangs.

5 Italy has been turning away migrants like these on board the Open Arms aid boat Credit: AP:Associated Press

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But this could prove tricky as Morocco has already rejected the idea.

Other radical plans would mean massive changes to some EU fundamentals.

One consideration could be to stop migrants moving about freely within the EU, but this would undermine the Schengen agreement, which allows free movement of people within the block.

Another could see the Dublin agreement - which states that migrants must be considered for asylum in the first safe country where they arrive - ripped up.

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