Open Arms, Salvini asked for 6 years for kidnapping. Meloni: very serious precedent. Anm: serious statements

The PM continued: "There is a key principle that cannot be debated: between human rights and the protection of state sovereignty, it is human rights that must prevail in our system, fortunately democratic." "All the officials, all the ministers, all the witnesses we heard in this trial said they did not know whether there had been terrorists, weapons, propaganda material on board the Open Arms. Even references to attempts to redistribute migrants before the pos cannot work: there can be no subordination of respect for human rights and the redistribution of migrants. First you get the migrants off and then you redistribute them: otherwise you risk playing politics on people who are suffering'.

The League leader and deputy prime minister's reply was prompt: 'Today in Palermo, the public prosecution will make its demands at the trial in which I am accused of kidnapping. I risk up to fifteen years in prison for keeping my word to the voters. I would do it all again: defending borders from illegal immigrants is not a crime. Full ahead, without fear'.

During the indictment, Prosecutor Ferrara added: 'Not every country can be considered a safe haven, because not every country has democratic rules and respect for human rights. Libya and Tunisia are not countries where you can apply a pos. This is also said by the current Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi who in his testimony said that the centres in Libya are definitely illegal centres, we have never handed people over to the Libyans'.

Awaiting the defence's reply scheduled for 18 October, Salvini's defence speaks. "With this introduction, it is of intuitive evidence, the prosecutor is proceeding with an indictment against the security decree bis which is an act of the government and against the political line first redistribute and then disembark. He has indeed made a judgment of great contestation of this line, carried out by the entire government. I believe that even though he said that this was not really meant to be an intervention against politics, when he says that at the technical round table the decrees and directives are all unacceptable, intolerable and contrary to human rights, in reality he is prosecuting the political line of that government. That is how it is for now'. This was said by Matteo Salvini's lawyer Giulia Bongiorno. Bongiorno continued: "It is a somewhat contradictory indictment. There is no Salvini conduct in the dock but a political line in the dock'.

"Salvini did his duty as a minister. I am convinced that there is always a judge who recognises the correctness of the behaviour of a minister whose duty is also to defend legality and I believe that Salvini has done so'. So said Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani on the Open Arms trial whose indictment by the prosecutor began this morning in Palermo.

PD secretary Elly Schlein found 'very inappropriate the intervention of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni' on Matteo Salvini's request for conviction for the Open Arms affair. "We think that the executive and judicial powers are separate and autonomous. It is a principle called separation of powers."

Musk instead stands with Salvini. "That crazy prosecutor should be the one going to jail for 6 years, this is crazy". Elon Musk wrote this on X, commenting on the Palermo prosecutor's request for six years' imprisonment for deputy prime minister and infrastructure minister Matteo Salvini.

"I express my full and affectionate solidarity with my colleague Salvini. Regarding the process, its origin and characteristics, it brings me back to the many articles I wrote on the subject before I became a minister'. Thus the Minister of Justice, Carlo Nordio, on the sidelines of the Frecce Tricolori demonstration in Jesolo.