League leader Matteo Salvini
said his conscience was clear on Wednesday ahead of a vote in
the Senate on whether prosecutors should be able to proceed
against him for allegedly illegally detaining a group of migrant
when he was interior minister in a previous government.
"Ready to intervene in the Senate with head held high and the
clear conscience of someone who has defended his land and his
people," Salvini said via Twitter.
He also paraphrased a quoted by poet and fascist sympathizer
Ezra Pound: "If a man is not willing to fight for his ideas,
either his ideas are worth nothing, or he is worth nothing".
Salvini could be sent to trial for his conduct when he was
interior minister for failing to give the ok for more than 100
rescued migrants to disembark from the Gregoretti Coast Guard
ship for several days during a long standoff in July.
The Senate's immunity panel has given the OK for the Catania
court of ministers' request to parliament to proceed against
Salvini for allegedly abusing his power.
The floor of the Upper House now needs to decide whether to
ratify the decision to lift Salvini's parliamentary immunity.
Salvini, who operated a closed ports policy while interior
minister in the last government, sending the League's poll
ratings sky-high, faced prosecution before but his parliamentary
immunity was never lifted so he could go to trial in previous
similar cases.
He has said that, as in other such cases, his decision was
made with the rest of the government he was then part of.
Premier Giuseppe Conte, on the other hand, said he was not
involved in the specific decision of whether to allow the
migrants to disembark.
Salvini pulled the plug on Conte's first government in August
prompting the creation of a new ruling majority.
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