Between a handful of anarchist militants and a government that has made the restoration of state authority its raison d’être, the dying body of a convicted terrorist rekindles a recurring debate in Italy on the conditions of detention of some prisoners. After more than a hundred days of a hunger strike launched to protest against the particularly harsh prison regime to which he has been subjected since the spring of 2022, Alfredo Cospito was transferred on Monday January 30 from the high security unit of the prison in Sassari, Sardinia, to a prison in Milan, where he can be treated.
After a spectacular mobilization of the anarchist movement in his favor over the past few days, the “Cospito case” keep dividing. Some denounce his hunger strike as a “blackmail against the state”, such as former judge Piercamillo Davigo. Others claim that its survival be guaranteed, going so far as to appeal to the pope, like the former senator and undersecretary at the Ministry of Justice Luigi Manconi in the columns of The print.
The recent scattered actions launched against symbols of the Italian state, in the peninsula and abroad, have also given a new opportunity to the government dominated by the extreme right of Giorgia Meloni to assert its security posture. “The state does not get along with those who threaten it”, thus declared in a press release the presidency of the council, excluding the suspension of the prison regime applied to Alfredo Cospito. “The alert level has increased, says one to the Italian Ministry of the Interior. Lhe government remains on a line of firmness and will not have conditions imposed by violence. »
Menaces et cocktails Molotov
A series of recent attacks attributed to Italian and European anarchists are at fault. As a weakened echo of a political radicalism belonging to a now distant era, it was reported in Italy that threatening letters were sent accompanied by pistol bullets against a magistrate and a local newspaper. Two police stations were also targeted by Molotov cocktails overnight from Sunday to Monday in Rome and Milan, while small demonstrations were organized in several Italian cities, including Rome, where clashes with the police took place. location. The Interior Ministry’s Anti-Terrorism Strategic Analysis Committee is due to meet on Wednesday.
Signs of solidarity from the European anarchist movement, the car of an Italian diplomat was set on fire in Berlin, while in Barcelona the Italian consulate suffered minor damage accompanied by anarchist slogans. Qualified as attacks by the executive, which made « cas Cospito » the main topic on the agenda of Monday’s Council of Ministers, these specific actions have contributed to trap the debate launched by the prisoner’s hunger strike in solitary confinement.
You have 42.47% of this article left to read. The following is for subscribers only.