Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s government, which has already put several thousand soldiers on the streets of Italy, was yesterday to legalize vigilante patrols and set out the guidelines under which they can operate.
The plans prompted an outcry from opposition politicians and police unions, but got a mixed reception from Italy’s mayors, who must decide whether they want law enforcement volunteers in their towns. An overwhelming majority of those in favor run cities in the north, where the anti-immigrant Northern League has long argued for wider use of vigilantes.
The interior minister, Roberto Maroni, a member of the Northern League, denied that the plan was to introduce vigilantism to Italy: “The decree does not create [vigilante] patrols; it regulates them.”
After rejecting the scheme, Rome’s mayor, Gianni Alemanno, a former neo-fascist, appears to have embraced it. The head of his council’s security committee, Fabrizio Santori, said vigilantes in fluorescent jackets would be deployed in parks, outside schools and at tourist sites.
Taking advantage of a gap in existing legislation, volunteers have formed groups to carry out patrols in cities including Milan, Padua, Parma and Bologna.
Last month vigilante groups from the left and the right clashed violently in the Tuscan town of Massa Carrara.
The rules will restrict groups such as the Italian National Guard, which is being investigated by a prosecutor in Turin. The Guard, which claims 2,000 members, has a reconnaissance plane and a uniform, complete with armbands, reminiscent of the Nazi SA.
But one of the biggest existing groups, the Milan-based City Angels, which focuses on social work as much as crime prevention, expressed concern that the guidelines would be too restrictive.
The leader of Italy’s biggest opposition group, Dario Franceschini of the Democratic party, called the use of vigilantes “demagogic and dangerous.”
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) launched a week-long diplomatic blitz of South America on Thursday by inaugurating a massive deep-water port in Peru, a US$1.3 billion investment by Beijing as it seeks to expand trade and influence on the continent. With China’s demand for agricultural goods and metals from Latin America growing, Xi will participate in the APEC summit in Lima then head to the Group of 20 summit in Rio de Janeiro next week, where he will also make a state visit to Brazil. Xi and Peruvian President Dina Boluarte participated on Thursday by video link in the opening
‘CHINA HAWKS’: Rubio and Michael Waltz, who is said to be next national security adviser, view Beijing as a threat and challenge to US economic and military might US president-elect Donald Trump on Monday announced new members of his incoming administration and was expected to pick US Senator Marco Rubio as secretary of state. Rubio and US Representative Michael Waltz, who has been lined up for the powerful US national security adviser role, have notably hawkish views on China, which they see as a threat and challenge to US economic and military might. The two appointees, both from Florida, would be key architects of Trump’s “America First” foreign policy, with the incoming president having promised to end the wars raging in Ukraine and the Middle East, and avoid any more
HOPEFUL FOR PEACE: Zelenskiy said that the war would ‘end sooner’ with Trump and that Ukraine must do all it can to ensure the fighting ends next year Russia’s state-owned gas company Gazprom early yesterday suspended gas deliveries via Ukraine, Vienna-based utility OMV said, in a development that signals a fast-approaching end of Moscow’s last gas flows to Europe. Russia’s oldest gas-export route to Europe, a pipeline dating back to Soviet days via Ukraine, is set to shut at the end of this year. Ukraine has said it would not extend the transit agreement with Russian state-owned Gazprom to deprive Russia of profits that Kyiv says help to finance the war against it. Moscow’s suspension of gas for Austria, the main receiver of gas via Ukraine, means Russia now only
RSS