Latest news with #MatteoSalvini
Local Italy
2 days ago
- Politics
- Local Italy
FACT CHECK: Does Italy grant more citizenships than any other EU country?
As Italy prepares to vote on June 8-9th in a referendum on easing rules on applying for citizenship through naturalisation, or residency, the main argument against the proposal remains that it would make things too 'easy' for applicants. The strongest opposition to changing the rules comes from the government itself, with senior ministers of the ruling hard-right parties calling for supporters to abstain from voting, and insisting that making it easier for long-term residents to become Italian nationals would be 'dangerous'. According to Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini, leader of the anti-immigrant League party, cutting the wait time to apply from ten years down to five would mean "indiscriminately extending" the granting of citizenship. Italy is already 'the first European country in terms of granting citizenship every year,' he claimed at a press conference on May 19th. But data shows us that this is not strictly true, particularly when it comes to applications via the residency route. Italy has three main routes for citizenship applications: ancestry, residency, and marriage. Ancestry has long been the most commonly-taken route, followed by residency. According to the most recent statistics available from Eurostat, in 2023 Italy granted citizenship to some 214,000 residents. Spain meanwhile approved 240,000 requests from residents in the same year. In 2022, Italy was actually the European country with the highest number of applications for citizenship via residency granted, while in 2021 it ranked fourth, behind Spain, France and Germany. The above graph shows the rate of annual citizenship applications granted by Spain (in green) compared to Italy (in pink). Source: Eurostat The overall comparison shows that, between 2014 and 2023, Italy ranked first in the EU for citizenship for five years out of ten, not 'every year,' as Salvini claims. Going further back, in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Italy granted citizenship at a much lower rate. And when we look at the numbers of new citizens via residency in each country as a percentage of the population, Italy drops further down the rankings. For example, in 2023 Italy granted citizenship to 3.6 foreign nationals per thousand residents, the fifth highest number behind Luxembourg, Sweden, Spain and Belgium. If the referendum passes, estimates suggest some 1.4 million people would be immediately eligible to apply for citizenship. However, the rules on eligibility would otherwise remain unchanged, meaning this would be unlikely to increase the number of applicants in the long term. And Italy is already set to see a sharp decline in the total number of applications for citizenship filed and granted in future. By far the largest proportion of all new Italian citizenship applications are made via ancestry, often by descendants of Italians who moved abroad several generations ago. But at the end of March 2023, the number of people eligible to apply via ancestry was slashed dramatically in reforms pushed through by the government.
Reuters
3 days ago
- General
- Reuters
Italy calls Council of Europe 'shameful' after warning on police racism
ROME, May 29 (Reuters) - Italy lashed out at the Council of Europe on Thursday and defended its police after the European human rights body named Italy among countries where racist conduct among law enforcers was a problem. In presenting its 2025 annual report on Wednesday, the head of the Council's Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) urged Italy to launch an independent enquiry into evidence that its police disproportionately targeted immigrants. Bertil Cottier said so-called "racial profiling", by which the police stop people on the basis of their skin colour or presumed nationality or religion, appeared to be an issue in Italy and called on the government to look into it. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and her deputy Matteo Salvini, who both lead far-right parties that base their appeal on law-and-order and the fight against illegal immigration, bluntly dismissed the suggestion. "ECRI's words, accusing the Italian police of racism, are simply shameful," Brothers of Italy chief Meloni posted on social media platform X on Wednesday. League leader Salvini doubled down on Thursday, telling reporters in Rome that the anti-racism panel "should be ashamed," and calling it "another useless body paid for by Italian and European citizens, that produces rubbish in return." The head of state Sergio Mattarella summoned Italy's police chief for a meeting on Thursday, "to re-confirm the admiration and trust of the country in its law enforcers." The Council of Europe did not respond to a request for comment. The Strasbourg-based organisation, which has 46 member states, was founded in 1949 to promote democracy and human rights in the continent. The latest ECRI report was an overview of its activities in 2024 and did not specifically discuss the Italian situation. However, in ECRI's latest country-specific report in October, it flagged "numerous accounts of racial profiling by law enforcement officials, targeting especially Roma and people of African descent" in Italy.
Local Italy
20-05-2025
- Politics
- Local Italy
FACT CHECK: Is air travel in Italy really becoming more pet-friendly?
Earlier this month, Italy announced that it had updated its air travel regulations for pets, allowing medium and large dogs to travel in the cabin alongside their owners for the first time. Italy's civil aviation authority ENAC confirmed the policy change in a press release that said pets could now be transported in cabins 'beyond the current limit of 8-10 kg'. "From now on dog and cat owners will have less difficulty flying with their four-legged friends," said Transport Minister and Deputy PM Matteo Salvini on his social media accounts. "Promise kept!" he added. The announcement was hailed by various travel news sites as a " landmark move set to transform pet-friendly travel" and a " pet travel revolution". Il Messaggero newspaper even went so far as to argue the move could have "significant economic repercussions" for the country, enabling Italy to become a European capital for pet tourism. But a closer look reveals that the rule change is unlikely to bring about the revolution these headlines suggest. As political fact-checking site Pagella Politica pointed out, the measure doesn't actually require airlines operating in Italy to increase their weight limit for pets, but merely gives them the option of doing so. Many airlines don't allow pets to travel on their planes at all unless they are service animals; for customers of these companies, the rule change won't make any difference. The new rules also say that pets "must be placed in approved carriers, which can also be placed on seats, without obstructing emergency exits or crew operations," and that these "must be secured with belts or specific anchoring systems." This means any carrier brought into the cabin must be able to fit on a plane seat, usually around 40-50cm in width: not large enough to contain a Labrador, let alone a Saint Bernard. Publicity stunt Salvini needs an easy win: his hard-right, anti-immigrant League party has waned in both popularity and influence in recent years, and is now polling at just over 8 percent, compared to 34 percent in 2019. When joining PM Giorgia Meloni's coalition government in 2022, he pushed hard to become interior minister, but instead found himself shunted into the unglamorous role of minister for transport and infrastructure. Since then, he has spent much of his time trying to cement his legacy through a contested project to build a bridge over the Strait of Messina, while periodically making headlines for arguing with other members of his own coalition. It's not surprising then that he'd make the most of the opportunity to win some support by throwing his weight behind as uncontroversial a campaign as increasing rights for pets and their owners.
Reuters
19-05-2025
- Business
- Reuters
Work on long-debated bridge to Sicily could begin in coming months
ROME, May 19 (Reuters) - Work to build a giant bridge connecting the Italian mainland to the island of Sicily is expected to begin over the summer, the infrastructure minister said on Monday, vowing to block any attempt by criminal groups to infiltrate the costly project. The project has been talked about for decades as a way to help develop the impoverished south of Italy but appeared to have been killed off for good in 2013, when the company created to oversee its construction was closed down as part of a drive to curb state spending and rein in public debt. However, Infrastructure Minister Matteo Salvini, the leader of the co-ruling League party, made it a priority and the government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has set aside 13.5 billion euros ($15.2 billion) to build it. "If we are particularly, I won't say clever, but lucky and consistent, summer 2025 is the one for the works," Salvini told a press conference. The CEO of the bridge company, Pietro Ciucci, said the project still needed a final green light from a state committee overseeing strategic infrastructure and he hoped to submit the request by the end of June. The construction, by a consortium led by Italy's Webuild ( opens new tab, would be some 3.6 km (2.2 miles) long, feature a central span measuring 3.3 km, and connect Sicily to the southern Calabria region. It has become a highly divisive issue in Italy. The bridge draws fierce criticism from those who question the wisdom of building it in an earthquake zone and those who say it would be a waste of money harmful to the landscape, amid fears that the Cosa Nostra and 'Ndrangheta gangs based in the area could infiltrate the works to reap huge profits. But the project also has strong support from those who believe a fast rail and road connection as an alternative to the current ferry crossing of the Strait of Messina would boost southern Italy. Salvini rebuffed security concerns, saying the bridge would be able to withstand the forces of nature, and maintained that refusing to implement projects in mafia-tainted areas would amount to a "state surrender" to the criminals. Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi said a centralised anti-mafia body would make checks on companies involved, with a focus on those sectors particularly exposed to mob infiltration, such as the disposal of waste materials. ($1 = 0.8883 euros)
Gulf Insider
07-05-2025
- Politics
- Gulf Insider
Italy: Outrage As Kindergarten Takes Christian Children To Mosque To Kneel And Praise Allah
Children at a private Catholic nursery in Italy were taken on a day trip to a mosque where they were taught how to kneel, to praise Allah and pray to Mecca, sparking fury in the community. Photos of the day trip were posted to Facebook by the Kindergarten and subsequently picked up by Matteo Salvini's conservative Lega Party prompting the issue to blow up online. The pictures show the young Christian children, aged between 3-5, kneeling with their foreheads to the ground and listening to an imam who is leading them in an Islamic prayer. Italian outlet Libero 25 reports that the incident took place in Ponte della Priula, a small municipality in the Treviso region with a population of just 5,000. Click here to read more…
