Activists occupy Hungarian consulate in Venice on Salis case

(ANSA) - ROME, FEB 9 - Activists on Friday morning occupied the Hungarian consulate in Venice to demand the release form detention of Ilaria Salis, the 39-year-old Monza elementary school teacher and antifascist militant facing up to 24 years in Budapest for allegedly attacking two neo Nazis last February.
    Thirty members of the leftwing Rivolta (Revolt) social centre occupied the premises in Piazzale Roma at the same time that Justice Minister Carlo Nordio was visiting nearby Padua and called to "Free Ilaria Salis at once".
    "We are here because we want her freedom, because this trial is a farce that intends only to punish antifascism, in a state where anti-migrant border patrols are not only tolerated, but promoted," the activists said.
    "It is an anti-democratic policy," they added.
    Images last month of Salis being led into in a Budapest court on a chain and wearing hand and ankle cuffs and simultaneous unconfirmed media reports of substandard detention conditions including bed bugs, mice, filth and inhuman punishments led to a public outcry in Italy, prompting Rome to protest and Premier Giorgia Meloni to secure a promise from her Hungarian counterpart Viktor Orban that the militant would get a fair trial in good conditions.
    Salis' family and lawyers are asking for her to be released to house arrest in Hungary or Italy pending the conclusion of her trial. (ANSA).