Govt doesn't want to repeal 'odious' torture law - Nordio

(ANSA) - ROME, MAR 29 - Justice Minister Carlo Nordio on Wednesday said the government did not want to repeal a law on torture, which he called an odious crime, after Premier Giorgia Meloni's rightwing Brothers of Italy (FdI) party filed a bill to repeal it.
    "The crime of torture is a hateful offence and we have every intention of keeping it; the government has no intention of repealing it," said Nordio, a former prosecutor.
    Responding to a query at question time, Nordio explained that there are only technical issues that "need to be remodelled." Ilaria Cucchi, a member of the opposition Italian Left-Green Alliance who lost her brother to police brutality in 2009, on Friday appealed to President Sergio Mattarella to not sign into law the bill presented by the ruling FdI that would eliminate the crime of torture from the Italian penal code.
    Senator Cucchi, who was elected to parliament for the first time in September and whose surveyor brother Stefano died after a police beating upon being picked on a minor drugs charge, cited the suspension of 23 Biella Prison officers for 'torturing' three inmates Thursday as the latest episode militating in favour of keeping the crime on the books.
    FdI on Friday denied the reports it had filed a bill to repeal torture as a crime saying it simply wanted to better clarify the offence so as to safeguard police and prison officers accused of it. (ANSA).