Open Arms Trial: Salvini in the bunker courtroom. League in the square with Giorgetti

“Here is the bunker room of the Pagliarelli prison in Palermo. Head held high, without fear, for Italy and the Italians”. This was written in X by Matteo Salvini, leader of the League, who this morning is in the bunker room of the Palermo prison for the hearing of the Open Arms trial.

The Minister of Infrastructure and Transport is accused of kidnapping and refusal of official acts, for having prevented the disembarkation of the Spanish NGO ship carrying 147 migrants stranded half a mile from Lampedusa. The minister arrived together with the lawyer Giulia Bongiorno. In the indictment of two hearings ago, the prosecution asked for 6 years in prison for the League leader.

League in the square. Giorgetti is there

At the same time, again in Palermo, in Piazza Politeama, a demonstration organized by the League in support of Salvini is underway. Also on the street are Giancarlo Giorgetti, Giuseppe Valditara, Roberto Calderoli. “I am here because I was in government with him at that time and because I am from the League”, commented the Minister of Economy.m Together with them, a large group of parliamentarians from the League, who wear a shirt bearing the writing: “Guilty of having defended Italy, I am with Salvini.” In the square an amplifier transmits the voice of Giulia Bongiorno, who gives the defense speech at the trial.

The defense: the NGO ship could have gone to Spain

“From 15 to 20 August Open Arms had many solutions and not just those that were talked about. There is something more, an opening, a possibility created by the Coast Guard, which I would define as ‘human rights’. It was enough to declare not adapt to living together on board – accuse, insomnia or stress, in short – and you were disembarked, which happens after August 18: Open Arms receives orders from Spanish authorities to head to Spain but refuses”, said the lawyer. The ship of the Spanish NGO, adds the lawyer, refuses a first Spanish port “because it is too distant”, it is offered “a patrol boat escort but it refuses and says no to a closer port, Palma de Mallorca”.

For Bongiorno “we must get away from the logic which is all a right: a right is one thing, a claim is another thing. The right to disembark is one thing. Deciding where, how, why and when to disembark is something completely different”.

But why, Bongiorno asks, “if there were all these options, if there was this passage opened by the Coast Guard that allowed disembarkation if the migrants declared ‘I don’t fit in’, if there were these availability, Open didn’t have them did they disembark? The answer is a video in which at the end of this story, on August 20, you see an explosion of enthusiasm on board and those who comment say that they were not happy because they disembarked, but because ‘the Minister of the Interior fell’ Italian’. On August 20th he is not happy because he lands, but because ‘Salvini has fallen’ and the person who says this is Oscar Camps”, the founder of the Spanish NGO.

“Even the prosecution’s consultant came to this trial to say that there was no hole in the boat, no crack, no damage. They were equipped with a satellite phone on board. The truth, in light of this information, is that this boat had to go there, at that point. There is no distress, it was not a casual meeting but there was a real appointment.” Thus the lawyer Giulia Buongiorno, Matteo Salvini’s lawyer, opening her speech in the Open Arms trial, in which Salvini is accused of kidnapping and refusal of official documents for having delayed the disembarkation of 147 migrants on board of the NGO vessel Open Arms in August 2019.

“Tar obliges assistance not disembarkation”

For Bongiorno, “on the TAR’s provision it is impossible to say that it could have completely or partially annulled the Salvini decree. The TAR says that assistance was needed. I won’t go into too much detail and refer to memory but here I would like to say that in that provision , issued at the hearing of another party, Italy must only provide assistance, there is no mention of a disembarkation obligation”.

Escort assigned to Righi

Even the deputy prosecutor Giorgia Righi, involved in the Open Arms trial, moves with the escort. In fact, with this security device the prosecutor arrived at the bunker room of the Pagliarelli prison, where she represents the prosecution together with the deputy Marzia Sabella and the deputy Calogero Ferrara. Righi – who is also part of the Palermo DDA – was the only prosecutor representing the prosecution in this trial who was not escorted. A measure that became necessary after the threats received by the magistrates following the hearing in which a 6-year sentence was requested for the current deputy prime minister Matteo Salvini.