Milan mayor says agents ‘not welcome’ in co-host city and Italy can take care of security itself.

A unit of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents will have a security role in the Winter Olympic Games in Italy, sparking uproar and petitions against the deployment.

Sources at the US embassy in Rome confirmed a statement from ICE, the agency embroiled in a brutal immigration crackdown in the US, saying that federal agents would support diplomatic security details during the Milan-Cortina Games but would not run any enforcement operations.

The statement said: “At the Olympics, ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) is supporting the US Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Service and host nation to vet and mitigate risks from transnational criminal organisations.

“All security operations remain under Italian authority.”