Grasso warns on top court judges

(ANSA) - Florence, November 26 - If the new date set for a joint parliamentary session to elect three Constitutional Court judges is not "usefully used to arrive at a nomination" then the time has come to proceed with unlimited voting, Senate Speaker Pietro Grasso said Thursday.
    Parliament is to reconvene in a joint session next Tuesday to elect three judges to the 15-member court after none of the candidates reached the necessary quorum of 571 votes on Wednesday. Augusto Barbera, Giovanni Pitruzzella and Francesco Paolo Sisto all fell short of the mark after being agreed in a deal between the Democratic Party (PD) of Premier Matteo Renzi and ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia (FI) with opposition from the anti-establishment Five Star Movement (M5S). "After 28 votes I think we demand that our parliament and the political class finally come up with an answer," Grasso said. "At a time of international crisis it is a weakness that we cannot show," he continued. The PD and FI have both confirmed their candidates. The constitutional court is composed of 15 judges of whom five are appointed by the president of the republic, five by the supreme council of the magistrature and 5 by parliament in a joint session.