Alfredo Cospito has been asking for greater than 100 days for him and for the greater than 700 prisoners within the 41 bis system. It is essentially the most restrictive of the Italian jail system and has been beneath debate for years in public opinion. backtracks on his standing as a “terrorist”
The file of the “Cospito case” was on the desk of the Meloni Government because it got here to energy final October. Just two days earlier than the brand new prime minister was to swear in his workplace, on October 20, the 55-year-old anarchist Alfredo Cospito started a starvation strike within the Sassari jail, the place he was imprisoned. His protest centered on the exhausting jail regime, essentially the most restrictive within the Italian jail system, 41 bis, which was utilized to him final May for varied crimes dedicated. In addition, he refused to acknowledge the “ergastolo ostativo”, which suggests life imprisonment, and that falls on his head, for which he won’t ever be capable to entry the advantages that different prisoners have.
What till yesterday appeared like an virtually residual situation has change into a central downside for the Executive, with the hazard of a deadly finish if the prisoner’s situations worsen. He has been transferred within the final hours from the jail in Sardinia the place he was detained to the Opera jail within the province of Milan. The change has been determined given his medical situations. Cospito has misplaced greater than 50 kg in three months and wears varied shirts and pants to face up to the change in temperature as a consequence of weight reduction. He refuses to eat any sort of meals. The docs warn that his coronary heart might not take it and in current days they’ve requested for a right away switch to a facility able to caring for his well being issues. The Milan jail, with a really environment friendly well being care division, will enable for higher management, however neither the Italian state nor the prisoner appear to relent in a scenario that touches the abyss.
It will proceed like this beneath the regime of 41 bis. This was said by the Minister of Justice Carlo Nordio on Tuesday morning, after taking the difficulty to the Council of Ministers the earlier afternoon. “In the face of violence, it isn’t handled. The wave of acts of vandalism present that the hyperlink between the detainee and his companions exists and is sufficient to justify the regime of 41 bis”, mentioned the minister who explains the switch to guard the prisoner’s well being, however doesn’t take any step again and says that It relies on the Supreme Court and never on its Ministry. In this assertion is the important thing to the controversy of this case. The 41 bis regime was created within the Nineteen Eighties, when Cosa Nostra declared its battle on the State, to stop gangsters from persevering with to run prison organizations from jail. For this motive, contacts with the skin are restricted to the utmost, the prisoner solely goes out into the open air for one hour a day and can’t have, for instance, entry to research or different programs.
Cospito rejects the motives of the earlier Minister of Justice, Marta Cartabia, who determined to use this penitentiary therapy that till now had been used for mafia bosses and terrorists. The anarchist has all the time acknowledged his crimes, together with an assault in 2006, for which he reductions his life sentence, however denies main any motion from jail. The 41 bis determination got here from Cospito’s publication from jail of some manifestos, articles and interviews the place he exalted, based on the judges, violence and the connection between the detainee and the collaborators launched. In brief, that he could be giving orders from jail. That is the place he equates his case to these of the mafia and he comes to totally contemplate himself a terrorist.
In the case of Cospito, it isn’t about hidden communications, however reasonably publications signed by him that, says the protection, they need to have intercepted earlier than, in any case. Hard voices even inside the magistracy, similar to the previous prosecutor Gherardo Colombo, who has signed the petition for the withdrawal of 41 bis to Cospito as a result of he considers it “unconstitutional”, fill the Italian press lately.
Not solely in technical circles, the 41 bis regime has been in the course of the controversy in Italy for a very long time. It should be made clear that it isn’t an aggravating circumstance, however a measure to regulate contacts with the skin world, thus assessing its hazard. Cospito defends that his strike can be for the greater than 700 prisoners with this regime in Italy, which he considers torture for human beings. The debate has additionally reached the political sphere, not solely due to the duties that the State has to face, the Government within the first occasion, relating to the way forward for the prisoner, but additionally due to the heated parliamentary debate on Tuesday morning on the case. From Brothers of Italy, Giovanni Donzelli, accused the opposition: “I wish to know if the left is on the facet of the State or the mafia and the terrorists?” Incendiary phrase that has brought on the session to be adjourned within the Chamber of Deputies within the face of complaints from the Democratic Party.
The deputy Giovanni Donzelli says that “Cospito – he mentioned the consultant of the FdI – is an influencer that the mafia is utilizing to surrender the State on 41 bis” pic.twitter.com/U9TMrxfSqy
— askanews (@askanews_ita) January 31, 2023
The imprisonment of Cospito in 41 bis has raised blisters in current months within the anarchist motion that, within the streets, requires justice. Among the incidents are two vandal assaults in opposition to the Italian diplomatic headquarters in Berlin and Barcelona, an unauthorized demonstration final Saturday in Trastevere, which ended with an agent injured with a bottle to the top. A second half, that very same evening, with two Molotovs within the parking zone of a police station on the opposite facet of Rome. Also sending a letter with a projectile to the director of the newspaper Il Tirreno. In brief, a local weather that’s getting hotter and warmer and that’s now a precedence for the Italian authorities.