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ITALIAN ELECTIONS

Italy’s Salvini questioned over Russia ties ahead of election campaign

Italian anti-immigrant leader Matteo Salvini's ties with Russia were again under scrutiny on Thursday following questions about the run-up to the collapse of Prime Minister Mario Draghi's government.

Published: 28 July 2022 18:22 CEST
Anti-immigrant League party leader Matteo Salvini has attracted scrutiny over his ties to Russia as Italy's general election campaign kicks off
Anti-immigrant League party leader Matteo Salvini has attracted scrutiny over his ties to Russia as Italy's general election campaign kicks off. Photo by PEDRO ROCHA / AFP.

La Stampa newspaper reported that a diplomat at the Russian embassy met one of Salvini’s aides in late May in Rome, and asked if any of the ministers from Salvini’s League party intended to resign from Draghi’s coalition.

The League pulled out of the government last week, alongside Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia and the populist Five Star Movement, causing Draghi to resign and triggering September elections.

The meeting was said to have taken place at the same time as Salvini drew criticism for conducting parallel diplomacy with Russia over the war in Ukraine.

READ ALSO: ‘No respect’: Polish mayor confronts Italy’s Salvini over Putin support

He planned a trip to Moscow ostensibly for peace talks — with flights bought by the Russian embassy, an arrangement his team insists was only done due to difficulties circumventing EU sanctions.

They said they reimbursed the embassy and the trip in the end never happened.

Foreign Minister Luigi di Maio on Thursday condemned “this attempt by the Russian side to have the League minister withdraw from Draghi’s government”.

Salvini “must explain the relations he has with Russia”, said Di Maio, like Draghi a strong advocate of EU sanctions against Moscow and Italy’s sending of weapons and money to help Kyiv’s resistance.

Przemysl’s mayor Wojciech Bakun (L) confronted Italian League leader Matteo Salvini (R) during his visit to Poland on March 8th over his admiration and support for the Russian president in recent years. Photo by STRINGER / ANSA / AFP

Enrico Letta, leader of the centre-left Democratic Party, also said the ties between Salvini and Russia were “concerning”.

Salvini hit back condemning “fake news”, putting the claims down to mud-slinging at the start of the campaign for the September 25th elections.

“A divided and desperate left… spends its time looking for fascists, Russians and racists who are not there,” he said, insisting his party was “on the side of the West”.

READ ALSO: ‘Not one ruble’: Italy’s Salvini denies his party took Russian money

The Russian embassy did not comment, but has previously denied interfering in Italian affairs.

Salvini has long admired President Vladimir Putin, even wearing t-shirts emblazoned with the Russian leader’s face, a stance that has become politically difficult since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

One of his election allies, Berlusconi, is also a personal friend of Putin, although their coalition partner Giorgia Meloni, who leads the far-right Brothers of Italy and is currently leading opinion polls, has strongly criticised Russian aggression.

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POLITICS

‘Worrying developments’: NGOs warn of growing pressure on Italian media freedom

Media freedom in Italy has come increasingly under pressure since Giorgia Meloni's hard-right government took office, a group of European NGOs warned on Friday following an urgent fact-finding summit.

Published: 17 May 2024 17:40 CEST
‘Worrying developments’: NGOs warn of growing pressure on Italian media freedom

They highlighted among their concerns the continued criminalisation of defamation – a law Meloni herself has used against a high-profile journalist – and the proposed takeover of a major news agency by a right-wing MP.

The two-day mission, led by the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ), was planned for the autumn but brought forward due to “worrying developments”, Andreas Lamm of the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPMF) told a press conference.

The ECPMF’s monitoring project, which records incidents affecting media freedom such as legal action, editorial interference and physical attacks, recorded a spike in Italy’s numbers from 46 in 2022 to 80 in 2023.

There have been 49 so far this year.

Meloni, the leader of the far-right Brothers of Italy party, took office as head of a hard-right coalition government in October 2022.

A key concern of the NGOs is the increased political influence over the RAI public broadcaster, which triggered a strike by its journalists this month.

READ ALSO: Italy’s press freedom ranking drops amid fears of government ‘censorship’

“We know RAI was always politicised…but now we are at another level,” said Renate Schroeder, director of the Brussels-based EFJ.

The NGO representatives – who will write up a formal report in the coming weeks – recommended the appointment of fully independent directors to RAI, among other measures.

They also raised concerns about the failure of repeated Italian governments to decriminalise defamation, despite calls for reform by the country’s Constitutional Court.

Meloni herself successfully sued journalist Roberto Saviano last year for criticising her attitude to migrants.

“In a European democracy a prime minister does not respond to criticism by legally intimidating writers like Saviano,” said David Diaz-Jogeix of London-based Article 19.

He said that a proposed reform being debated in parliament, which would replace imprisonment with fines of up to 50,000 euros, “does not meet the bare minimum of international and European standards of freedom of expression”.

The experts also warned about the mooted takeover of the AGI news agency by a group owned by a member of parliament with Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini’s far-right League party – a proposal that also triggered journalist strikes.

READ ALSO: How much control does Giorgia Meloni’s government have over Italian media?

Beatrice Chioccioli of the International Press Institute said it posed a “significant risk for the editorial independence” of the agency.

The so-called Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) consortium expressed disappointment that no member of Meloni’s coalition responded to requests to meet with them.

They said that, as things stand, Italy is likely to be in breach of a new EU media freedom law, introduced partly because of fears of deteriorating standards in countries such as Hungary and Poland.

Schroeder said next month’s European Parliament elections could be a “turning point”, warning that an increase in power of the far-right across the bloc “will have an influence also on media freedom”.

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