From the glittering world of Hollywood to classroom B2 in the bunker of the Pagliarelli prison in Palermo. The star will also be there Richard Gere among the witnesses of the trial against Matteo Salvini, accused with the accusation of kidnapping and refusal of official documents for the Open Arms affair. This was decided today, at the end of the first hearing, by the President of the second criminal section of the Court of Palermo Roberto Murgia. All the witnesses requested by the prosecution, represented in the courtroom by the Prosecutor Francesco Lo Voi, by the addition Marzia Sabella and by prosecutors Geri Ferrara and Giorgia Righi, but also those of the defense and civil parties were admitted.
And it was the civil lawyer of the Spanish NGO Open Arms Arturo Salerno who asked the Court to accept the request to hear Richard Gere. The American actor boarded the ship on August 9, 2019, to assist the 147 migrants rescued days earlier in the Mediterranean. But if the defense of Salvini, represented in the courtroom by the lawyer Giulia Bongiorno, speaks of an “overabundant” testimony, while saying he is favorable, the Prosecutor Francesco Lo Voi announces his sharp no to the testimony of Gere.
“The witness must be heard as he can provide a useful contribution. Beyond the spectacular aspects that the presence of a famous international actor could have, I do not think the prosecutor is interested – says Lo Voi – I must say that there are on the part of the our office has many other and much more qualified texts that may be able to report on the overall condition of the ship on the state of the shipwrecked. Richard Gere’s testimony can make a decisive contribution for this procedure “. Among the other admitted witnesses, the names of the former premier Giuseppe Conte, the ministers Luigi Di Maio and Luciana Lamorgese, and the former Maltese premier Jospeh Muscat also stand out. And again the former ministers Danilo Toninelli and Elisabetta Trenta .
A hearing that began shortly before 10 in an armored bunker classroom, indeed highly armored and prohibited to cameras, at the disposal of the President of the Court. While the reporters were able to watch in the next room, on a screen, due to the anti-Covid rules. The first to arrive is Open Arms founder Oscar Camps, who has pleaded a civil party in the process. “The meaning of being here today is to get a signal of justice,” Camps says. “Saving people is not a crime, but it is an obligation not only for captains, but for all States. Facilitating the identification of a safe harbor, regardless of the administrative situation of a State and the agreements of a State, has nothing to what to do with the political situation. It is a humanitarian act “, he says in Spanish.
At 10.30 the trial begins. The chancellor calls the parties, including all civil parties, over twenty. Meanwhile, outside the classroom, a protest demonstration by the young people of Our Voice begins with a flash mob with some young people pretending to swim on the high seas. In those same moments, Salvini takes a selfie in the courtroom and writes a tweet: “Here the courtroom of the Palermo prison – he writes – The trial wanted by the Left and by the fans of illegal immigration begins: how much will it cost Italian citizens? “.
At the beginning of the hearing, the prosecutor immediately asked for an interrogation of the former minister Salvini. And then a series of acts that also come from the Catania trial: the hearing minutes of the former Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, of the Minister of the Interior Luciana Lamorgese, of the Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio. For the accusation, in these words there would already be proof that Salvini’s initiative, in the summer of 2019, to block the Open Arms ship off the coast of Lampedusa with 147 migrants on board, would constitute the crime of kidnapping. There are 59 documents in all that prosecutors are asking to be acquired to support the accusation. Among these, the e-mails from Open Arms asking for the “Pos”, the safe harbor, the negative responses from the Interior Ministry, the letters with which Conte urged Salvini to disembark the minors. But also the medical and psychological certificates attesting the conditions in which 147 people were forced to live on board the ship of the Spanish NGO, from 15 to 20 August.
The defense raises with other acts that it asks to acquire: “Italy was not competent to assign safe harbor and Open Arms committed violations”, says lawyer Giulia Bongiorno. Who asks to bring the logbook of the NGO to the classroom. “These and other documents show that there was a line of government on these issues.” In short, for defense, the government agreed with Salvini’s line. And he says: “Even the Minister of the Interior Lamogese has made us wait up to ten days for the assignment of a safe harbor”. During the trial Salvini called Silvio Berlusconi. And at the end of the audience he announced: “This week we will meet with the six ministers”.
Outside the classroom, the leader of the League, who asks to have Giulia Bongiorno near, improvises a press conference. “But does it seem normal to you a process in which Richard Gere will come from Hollywood? I, generally, stay with my children on Saturday mornings.” Then he says: “I haven’t talked to Oscar Camps, I don’t take lessons from ship captains who feel they are above the laws. There are certainly economic reasons, in Italy there are several inquiries about the money that NGOs earn with this activity. . I would not want that beyond humanity there was an economic interest in this trafficking of human beings because some sentences in Italy, albeit in the first instance, have already condemned someone for having stolen thanks to illegal immigration “. But it also speaks of pensions, citizenship income, taxes. The next hearing was set for December 17. And before leaving Sicily, Salvini visited a dairy in Giardinello. The owner gave him a Sicilian cassata with the symbol of the League. Immediately after a lunch in Montelepre, the town of the bandit Salvatore Giuliano. To eat the typical Sicilian dishes. In the late afternoon he took the flight to Milan. But first he says: “Since I will often come to Palermo and next spring there will be administrative, and there is a mayor who for years has stopped being the mayor and an abandoned city, we will accompany the rebirth of Palermo. And I will give mine. small contribution with my monthly presence “. (by Elvira Terranova and Francesco Saita)
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