Musk presents award to Meloni, hails PM's 'incredible job'

(ANSA) - ROME, SEP 24 - The chief executive of Tesla Elon Musk presented Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni with the 'Global Citizen Award 2024 from Washington-based think tank Atlantic Council, praising her as "someone who is even more beautiful inside than outside".
    Musk said Meloni had done "an incredible job" as prime minister with "record growth and employment".
    "She is someone who is authentic, honest, truthful", added the billionaire during a ceremony at the Ziegfeld Ballroom in Manhattan, New York, on Monday night.
    And thanking Musk for his "precious genius", Meloni delivered a passionate defence of Western values.
    "There is a narrative that authoritarian regimes take good care" of their citizens, she said.
    "It concerns the idea of the inevitable decline of the West, the idea that democracies don't succeed in keeping promises.
    "An army of foreign and malign trolls and bots is deployed to manipulate reality and exploit our contradictions.
    "But fans of authoritarian regimes, let me tell you very clearly that we will defend our values", Meloni said, receiving the award.
    While rejecting authoritarian nationalism, Meloni said that "we should not be afraid to defend words like nation and patriotism" and noted that her vision was "democratic and secular".
    "In a time dominated by chaos, Italy stands firmly alongside those who defend their freedom and sovereignty, not only for it is right to do so, but also because it is in the interest of Italy and the West to prevent a future in which the law of the strongest prevails", she noted, evoking Ukraine. (ANSA).