Italians treatment of Roma people

[butchersapron]

Recent development:
Italy allows vigilantes for first time since Mussolini's Blackshirts

A new law gives an official stamp of approval to vigilante groups that have sprung up in several Italian cities, especially in the northern strongholds of the Right-wing, anti-immigrant Northern League.

The vigilantes will be able to alert police to public order offences or suspected criminals but do not have the power of arrest.

One group, known as the Italian National Guard, claims to have 2,000 members. It plans to dress its members in khaki shirts, black ties and black armbands bearing a red symbol that critics say resembles a swastika.

 

[purplex]

Recent development:
Italy allows vigilantes for first time since Mussolini's Blackshirts

wtf?

 

[Roadkill]

 

[yield]

Not sure if this has already been posted? Continuing on from the piece butchersapron posted.

Italy adopts law to curb migrants
BBC News. Friday, 3 July 2009

Italy's parliament has given final approval to a law criminalising illegal immigration and allowing citizens' patrols to help the police keep order.

 

[frogwoman]

My dissertation supervisor (who's a very clever guy btw and lived for years in italy - his wife is also italian) is convinced Italy is becoming fascist I dont know how much credence to give this as well but my friend has just come back from two years in Spain and says that he knows a lot (and i mean A LOT) of Italians who have left the country and are coming there. The Spanish press report a lot more about Italy than we get in the British media.

 

[isitme]

i'm going to cnp from another board

this is a really scary development

Been following this for a month or so and it just got silly. Basically Italy's government just passed a law which allows unarmed civilian patrols to police their own neighbourhoods. Apparently however there is some mystery over how stringent 'unarmed' is defined. Anyway one of the main groups to be organising people into these 'patrols' is the Neo Facist 'National Right' their leader Gaeteno Sayer makes Nick Griffin look like a moderate.

The country has obviously all gone collectivley mental. Not a suprise considering that their elected leader is an utter tool

This is the picture of the uniforms that the 'unarmed' vigilantes wear

Serious

A return of the black shirt gangs of the 20's and 30's to italian streets.

..................

Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, whose centre right wing coalition was elected on a tough law and order campaign, has insisted that vigilante groups, such as the Italian National Guard, would be simple 'citizen patrols'.
The group is based in Turin, but has offices in the south of Italy in Puglia and Calabria as well as on the island of Sicily.
Many Italians blame the country's growing crime rate on illegal immigrants and especially Romany gypsies and see the 'ronde' or vigilante patrols as a necessary course of action.
Marco Minniti, from the opposition centre left, described the situation as 'disconcerting delirium'.
'Entrusting the security of the country to political groups like this is a blow to the very heart of democracy,' he said.

Other opposition MP's called for the government to change the law and outlaw the vigilante groups as a result
But Interior Minister Roberto Maroni has given them his backing.
'Let's call them vigilante groups - if that's what we want,' Mr Maroni said.
'We have been accused of wanting to return to the era of the Blackshirts but we are simply giving the people a chance to participate in their security.'

Maurizio Monti, vice president of the Italian National Guard, said: 'We are a properly resgistered group and we will continue until someone can prove that we have broken a crime.
'The imperial eagle has been a symbol since the Roman times and so it's absurd to say it has anything to do with Fascism - if that is the case then all the monuments of Rome bearing the eagle should be pulled doon.
'The Italian National Guard is nothing to do with Fascism - Fascism has been confined to history.'
The bill will also make illegal immigration a criminal offence, will extend to six months the period immigrants and would-be asylum seekers can be kept in detention centers and sets a maximum three-year jail term for landlords who rent to illegal immigrants.
The Blackshirts were Fascist paramilitaries created by Mussolini and also inspired the British Union of Fascists led Sir Oswald Mosley.
Their methods became harsher as Mussolini's power grew, using violence, torture, gang rape, intimidation, and murder against political opponents - one of their distinctive techniques was force-feeding castor oil.


The scary thing is the government seem to embrace these organisations as almost a hidden hand of their policies. Maybe a repeat of the thirties isn't so improbable under certain circumstances ?

 

[frogwoman]

I like you as the voice of reason dude. Scary stuff

 

[Jeff Robinson]

Against the Reintroduction of Race Laws in Europe

To European democratic public opinion and the press that keeps it informed

Events in Italy have always – for better or worse – had an extraordinary influence on the whole of European society, from the Italian Renaissance to Fascism.

But, all too often, Europe has not become aware of these events in time.
There is currently a great deal of attention in major European newspapers on some aspects of the crisis that has engulfed our country. But we believe that it is our duty – the duty of all those living in Italy – to inform European public opinion on other alarming aspects that have not elicited such interest, such as the draft legislation proposed by the Italian Government, called the “Security Decree”. If it is not prevented, this legislation runs the risk of disfiguring the image of Europe and dealing a severe setback to human rights worldwide.

The Berlusconi Government, using security as a pretext, has imposed on our Parliament – over which it has total control – the adoption of laws discriminating against immigrants, laws the likes of which we had not seen in this country since the passing of the Fascist Race Laws.

The victim of the discrimination has changed: it is no longer the Jews but the undocumented migrant population, hundreds of thousands of people. But the discriminating measures have not changed: if passed, these new laws may, for example, forbid mixed marriages.

Such a prohibition would prevent a person from exercising a fundamental right, the right to marry without constraints of an ethnic or religious nature. The victims of discrimination would be denied this right simply on the basis of their nationality. Not to mention the fact that Italians would equally be denied their right to marry the person of their choice.

Another norm contained in the decree – even more abusive of human rights and dignity – is the prohibition for foreign women lacking permits (an administrative offence) to recognize their children at birth. Thus, the children born to “undocumented” foreign women, by virtue of a political decision by a temporary majority, shall be for their entire lives the children of unknown parents, they may be removed from their own mothers at birth and placed under the care of the State.

Not even Fascism had gone that far! The Race Laws introduced by the Regime in 1938 did not subtract children from their Jewish mothers, nor did they induce the mothers to abort rather than have their children confiscated by the State.

We would not be addressing European public opinion if the gravity of these measures were not such that it transcends national boundaries, calling for a reaction by all those who believe in our shared humanity. Europe cannot accept that one of its founding members regresses to primitive levels of social organization, contradicting international law and the very principles upon which the European political union is based.

It is in the interest of all of us that this not happen. It would dishonour us all.
European democratic public opinion must become aware of the disease ravaging Italy and act swiftly so that it does not spread further.
We are confident that each one of you will choose an effective way to demonstrate your opposition.

Roma, June, the 29th 2009

Andrea Camilleri, Antonio Tabucchi, Dacia Maraini, Dario Fo, Franca Rame, Moni Ovadia, Maurizio Scaparro, Gianni Amelio

(2 luglio 2009)

http://temi.repubblica.it/micromega-online/against-the-reintroduction-of-race-laws-in-europe/

 

[butchersapron]

Interesting that the law legalising vigilante/citizen patrols was brought in to outmanouvere centre-left city administrations who were already running hundreds of these bloody things (they're supposed to be run by municipalities - not just anyone). A clearer demonstration of a society wide political shift to the right it would be hard to find.