MILAN, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Migration can't be stopped, but can be managed to the benefits of Italy and Europe as a whole, outgoing Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni said here Wednesday.

Speaking at the Italian Institute for International Political Studies (ISPI), the center-left prime minister reviewed the government's foreign policy efforts in 2017.

"Everyone is free to say what they want during an electoral campaign, but promising that migration can be eliminated is highly improbable," Gentiloni said in reference to anti-immigrant pledges by right-wing parties ahead of the March 4 national election.

"The challenge is not to promise the elimination of these migration flows" but to defeat the criminal migrant-trafficking networks and "transform them into safe, manageable, compatible flows that are useful to our economies and our societies," Gentiloni said, "Italy and Europe need organized, secure and managed flows."

He also warned against "degenerating into hyper-nationalism and hostility" against the rest of the world.

There can be no contradiction between pride in one's national culture and identity and pursuing policies of openness and exchange on the international level, the Italian prime minister said. Italy "can never be the country of closure and aggression towards its neighbors," Gentiloni said.

"It is because we are enthusiastic about our identity and our national roots that we want to project them outwards into a world made of free trade, dialogue, peace, and international stability," he said.

"We can say proudly that the way in which our culture and identity looks out onto the world is that of a country that pursues dialogue, peace, trade, openness," Gentiloni said.

As an example of Italy's vocation for international dialogue and mediation, Gentiloni pointed to its agreement with Libyan authorities in January 2017, which led to "a plunge in migrant arrivals" along the central Mediterranean route.

As well, thanks to the Italy-Libya accord, the UN refugee agency gained access to migrant detention camps in Libya, and voluntary assisted repatriations jumped from 1,300 in 2016 to over 20,000 last year, Gentiloni said.