EU leaders call for more Europe despite populist backlash

The leaders of the euro area's three largest economies vowed to push ahead with the European project despite the populist backlash against Brussels.

Meeting on the Italian island of Ventotene, German chancellor Angela Merkel, French president Francois Hollande and Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi called for closer cooperation on security matters and improved opportunities for the young.

The aim of the European leaders was to lay the groundwork for the EU summit due to be be held in Bratislava in September.

In a ceremony charged with symbolism, they also paid homage to one of the European Union's founding fathers, Altiero Spinelli, a federalist who had been imprisoned on the island by the country's fascist dictator, Benito Mussolini, and to lay the groundwork for the EU summit due to be be held in Bratislava in September.

Renzi said Europe "must write a new chapter" following Brexit.

"Europe is not the problem. It's more the solution," he said in remarks from the flight deck of the Italian aircraft carrier Garibaldi, which was moored off the coast of the island.

"Immigration, it's Europe's fault, the economy is bad, it's Europe's fault. But that is not the case," he reportedly said at a press conference.

"We respect Great Britain’s decision but we also want to make clear that the other 27 [member countries] are banking on a safe and prospering Europe," Merkel said.

"To have security we need frontiers that are controlled so that is why we are working to reinforce coastguards and border guards," Hollande said.

"We want more coordination in the fight against terrorism."

Italy's Garibaldi was one of a number of vessels on an EU mission against people traffickers in the Mediterranean.