Italy spent hundreds of thousands of euros in European Union funds to escort the Aquarius migrant boat to Spain after refusing it permission to land at Italian ports.

The new populist coalition government in Rome used the turning away of the Aquarius to signal a new tougher anti-migrant stance shortly after the far-right League and anti-establishment Five Star Movement came to power just days earlier.

More than 600 refugees and migrants were left stranded at sea in a four-day standoff until Spain agreed to take in the charity boat at Valencia.

At least €200,000 euros (about £180,000), 90 percent of that journey’s costs, was paid for by cash from Brussels meant for emergency and rescue services in Italian waters, according to the EU Observer website, which made a freedom of information request to the Italian coastguard.

The embarrassing revelation that the EU had paid for the propaganda coup came as 177 migrants were refused permission to disembark in the Italian port of Catania for a sixth day in a row.

Matteo Salvini, the interior minister and leader of the League, said they would not be allowed to set foot on the Sicilian port “until Europe steps into help”.

Mr Salvini demanded the migrants, who were saved by the Italian coastguard and are mostly Eritrean, be redistributed across the bloc “in a spirit of solidarity” or be sent back to Libya.