Anti-mafia writer Roberto Saviano said
Wednesday he was "proud" to be going on trial on charges of
defaming former interior minister and rightwing anti-migrant
League leader Matteo Salvini for calling the current transport
minister and deputy premier a "bastard" while discussing
migrants on a TV show in December 20.
Saviano, who is also on trial separately for calling rightwing
Brothers of Italy (FdI) leader Giorgia Meloni, the current
premier, the same thing on the same show, said "I'm proud to be
a defendant because I can tell the court that party leaders and
ministers cannot dodge the possibility of criticism."
Saviano, author of the Camorra exposè Gomorra which earned him
police protection from the Neapolitan Mob, said he is also being
sued by Culture Minister Gennaro Sangiuliano for calling him a
"mediocre journalist and a biographer of Putin".
Saviano said "these three ministers of the same government have
decided to sue for damages a person who has dared to criticise
them".
Saviano also said that the mafia was exploiting the government's
"wrong" decision to put anarchist leader Alfredo Cospito under
the harsh 41 bis jail regime hitherto only reserved for Mob
bosses to stop them running affairs from inside prisons.
He said this had been shown by a leak of sensitive information
by FdI MP Giovanni Donzelli who criticised centre-left
opposition Democratic Party (PD) MPs for visiting Cospito to
check on his ailing health on a hunger strike on the same day
that a Camorra boss voiced support for the jailed anarchist, who
has lost 45kg and is in precarious health due to his hunger
strike.
"The revelations made in court by Donzelli, if true, show that
criminal organisations seek to take advantage and exploit a
wrong choice made by the institutions, namely the 41 bis given
to Alfredo Cospito," said Saviano, who has been in police
protection since the publication of Gomorra in 2006 lifted the
lid on the Casalesi clan of Campania's Camorra mafia, before
being turned into a 2008 film that won second prize at
Cannes and was the inspiration for a successful Sky TV series.
"In this sense, what parliamentarian Giovanni Donzelli said,
beyond the fact that he should not have said it, was useful,
because it confirms that organised crime tries to manipulate a
wrong choice to its own advantage"..
Cospito's lawyer confirmed Wednesday that his client is fighting
for 41 bis, which mandates almost complete isolation from the
outside world, to be lifted for all inmates including Mafia
dons.
Saviano's defamation trial against Salvini was adjourned to June
1, when the League leader will be heard.
Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi, who has vainly tried to
resurrect Salvini's former policy of blocking NGO run migrant
rescue ships, was also mentioned in the list of defence
witnesses.
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