Salis acquitted of damaging League gazebo in 2017 - lawyers

(ANSA) - ROME, JAN 31 - Lawyers acting for Ilaria Salis, the 39-year-old elementary school teacher and anti-Fascist activist on trial in Hungary for allegedly attacking two Hungarian neo-Nazis almost a year ago, said Wednesday their client had been acquitted of damaging a gazebo used by the right-wing League party in Monza in February 2017.
    Earlier the League, a government coalition partner led by Deputy Premier and Transport Minister Matteo Salvini, said in a statement that Salis had gone on trial for being part of a group that attacked the gazebo and assaulted two young women present, who allegedly subsequently identified her.
    "Ilaria Salis was acquitted for not committing the deed in relation to the attack on the League's gazebo in 2017," lawyer Eugenio Losco told ANSA.
    "Salis was not identified by the two League militants, but merely identified as a participant in the march that took place that day in Monza from a video produced as evidence.
    "The judge stated in the sentence that she appears to have participated only in the procession without in any way taking part in the criminal activities of other people, or having in any way encouraged or supported others to do so," he explained.
    In its statement the League also said that the current attention to the situation involving Salis in Hungary "provides an opportunity to reiterate that the legitimate exercise of dissent should never result in episodes of violence, especially such as those carried out against defenceless young women attacked by a mob as happened in Monza".
    On Tuesday evening Salis' father Roberto denounced a growing effort to discredit his daughter's actions, pointing to "photos going around of a crime committed in Hungary for which my daughter is not accused".
    Rome has protested to Budapest after Salis was led into court on a chain with her hands and ankles cuffed amid unsubstantiated reports of inhumane prison conditions. (ANSA).