Constitutional Court approves five justice referendums

(ANSA) - ROME, FEB 16 - The Constitutional Court said Wednesday that it had approved five referendums on issues related to Italy's justice system, and rejected one.
    It also turned down a referendum about decriminalizing cannabis growing.
    The approved referendums include one on abolishing the so-called Severino law that stops people definitively convicted of several serious crimes, including corruption, from being able to stand in European, national and regional elections for six years.
    This referendum was proposed by the League and Radicali parties.
    Ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi was ejected from the Senate in 2013 and was banned from running in elections for several years under the Severino law after being convicted in a tax-fraud case.
    Another approved referendum is about stopping prosecutors changing careers to become judges and vice-versa.
    The other two approved regard cases in which people can be detained on remand and the election of the members of the judiciary's self-governing body, the CSM.
    The fifth referendum declared admissible was on lawyers' voting to assess the performance of magistrates.
    A sixth referendum, about making magistrates pay for miscarriages of justice, was rejected.
    On Tuesday the court said it had rejected a petition to stage a referendum on legalising euthanasia.
    The court said that, if the referendum were approved, "the Constitutionally necessary minimum protection of human life would not be preserved". It referred specifically to the vulnerable. (ANSA).