Crosetto warns of 'judicial opposition' to Meloni govt

(ANSA) - ROME, NOV 26 - Italian magistrates union ANM reacted angrily on Sunday after Defence Minister Guido Crosetto said in an interview that he considered opposition from elements within the judiciary to be the main threat Premier Giorgia Meloni's government faces.
    "The only major danger is from those who have always felt they are an antagonistic faction and have always undermined centre-right governments - judicial opposition," Crosetto told Il Corriere della Sera.
    "I've heard about meetings of a faction within the judiciary in which they talk about how to 'stop the anti-democratic drift Meloni is leading us to'.
    "Since we have seen all sorts of things in the past, if I know this country, I expect this season to open soon, before the European Elections".
    Late ex-premier and former centre-right leader Silvio Berlusconi often said that the many court cases he faced, only one of which led to a definitive conviction, were staged by politically-motivated elements within the judiciary.
    ANM President Giuseppe Santalucia accused Crosetto of spreading "fake news which has no foundation and hurts the institutions.
    "It is misleading to portray the judiciary as a political-party-like opposition," he said.
    The opposition, centre-left Democratic Party (PD) was critical too.
    "We are astonished by the statements made today by Minister Crosetto," said Debora Serracchiani, the PD's justice chief.
    "If the minister knows something that endangers national security, he should say so.
    "Otherwise, this government should stop making veiled threats and complaining of unfounded conspiracies in a bid to hide the difficulties of the (2024) budget (bill)".
    Later on Sunday Crosetto said he was "astonished" by the reaction to the interview.
    "First of all, because I have done everything but threaten or delegitimise anyone," he said, while at the same time giving examples of past cases of miscarriages of justice and saying it was not possible to "hide how a part, certainly not all, of the judiciary has behaved in Italian history.
    "'I only intend to defend the institutions by seeking the truth," he concluded. (ANSA).