Genoa remembers Morandi bridge victims on 2nd anniversary

(ANSA) - ROME, 14 AGO - Genoa on Friday remembered the 43 victims of the Morandi bridge collapse on the second anniversary of the disaster.
    The faces and names of the victims were screened at the start of an official commemoration ceremony.
    A new viaduct replacing the Morandi bridge, the San Giorgio bridge, was inaugurated earlier this month.
    In a message, President Sergio Mattarella said that the demands of the victims' families for "truth and justice" and that "no similar disasters happen with new mourning and new victims" was "right".
    The head of State also called for the reconstruction of "a reliable culture of security".
    Premier Giuseppe Conte said that a tragedy of this kind "must never happen again".
    He said the recent deal that will see that the Benetton group gradually exit Italian motorway company Autostrade per l'Italia (ASPI), with the State coming in. will "contribute to guaranteeing more control and security for our highway network".
    The ruling anti-establishment 5-Star Movement (M5S) had vowed to eject clothing icons the Benettons from ASPI, which it blamed for an alleged lack of maintenance that allegedly led to the bridge's collapse.
    The government had threatened to strip ASPI of its motorway concessions and has said that threat remains valid if the Benetton family backtracks on the deal.
    "Revocation (of the concessions) has never been ruled out," said Foreign Minister and M5S bigwig Luigi Di Maio.
    "Justice will only definitively be done when the Benettons are totally out of ASPI".
    Egle Possetti, the spokesperson for the committee representing the victims' families, called for reforms that would deliver faster justice.
    "Our relatives are the victims of a disaster that should never had happened," Possetti said.
    "Justice is crucial, it is one of the deterrents to other disasters taking place.
    "We hope to see major reforms.
    "It is no longer acceptable that trials can take decades and the injured patries, in addition to the pain, have to wait for justice that might never come.
    "Too often we see absurd attempts to mystify reality in court.
    "We can't allow it any more". (ANSA).