Police clashes with demonstrators in
Pisa Friday that brought a reprimand from President Sergio
Mattarella over excessive use of batons after five
pro-Palestinian protesters were hospitalised are isolated cases
and worse has been seen in the past, Interior Minister Matteo
Piantedosi said Monday.
"We are only dealing with isolated cases that are being assessed
and there has never been any change of strategy in a more
restrictive sense in the management of public order," said
Piantedosi amid reports that a criminal probe had been opened
into the allegedly heavy handed policing.
Moreover, he recalled, "in past years similar incidents have
occurred with even more serious incidents".
As well as in Pisa, cops baton charged pro-Palestinian
demonstrators in Florence and Catania Friday but no shocking
footage of officers repeatedly hitting protesters over the head
surfaced in the other two cities, unlike in Pisa.
Piantedosi went on to say that he agreed with Mattarella's
reprimand and also with the president's warning that politically
motivated insults and threats have reached a dangerous level in
Italy, with effigies of Premier Giorgia Meloni being burned and
splashed with red paint to symbolise the blood shed in Gaza.
Piantedosi reiterated to trade unions that he "fully shared
President Mattarella's words."
The Viminale chief is also convinced that "the authoritativeness
of the police force is not nourished by the use of force but is
rooted in the sacrifice of hundreds of fallen officers in the
fight against terrorism and crime, in the loyal defence of
democratic institutions even in the darkest years of the
Republic, in the ability to accompany the development of Italian
society with balance and professionalism.
"And I also share," he added, "the president's other previous
warning against the intolerable series of manifestations of
violence: insults, vulgarity of language, speeches devoid of
content but full of verbal aggression, even effigies burnt or
vilified".
The minister also reiterated that the government had utmost
confidence in Italy's police forces.
During the meeting at the Viminale with the leaders of the
confederal trade unions, according to ministry sources,
Piantedosi expressed the "utmost trust of the entire government
in the police force."
The men and women in uniform, he added, are "servants of the
State and workers who play a fundamental role in protecting
security and legality".
The opposition has condemned the allegedly excessive use of
truncheons in Pisa and has filed bills that would make it
compulsory for police to wear bodycams and have ID numbers on
their helmets.
The police baton charged the demonstrators in Pisa after they
tried to breach a police cordon and reach the university campus,
and in Florence after they tried to reach the US consulate.
Students staged another peaceful demo in Rome Sunday night
"against your truncheons".
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