The leaders of Italy's two biggest opposition parties, Elly Schlein.of the Democratic Party and ex-premier Giuseppe Conte of the 5-Star Movement (M5S), expressed dismay and demanded a response from the government on Sunday after a reporter for daily newspaper La Stampa, Andrea Joly, was attacked by far-right militants overnight.
"I express my solidarity and closeness with Andrea Joly, a journalist for La Stampa, who was attacked and beaten by CasaPound militants in Turin last night, just for having filmed them on his mobile phone while they were celebrating their anniversary outside a club," Schlein said.
"But I also express great concern about the climate of impunity that we continue to see in the face of such serious episodes: what more must we wait for for neo-fascist organisations to be disbanded, as the Constitution says? "We ask Premier Giorgia Meloni and Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi to intervene immediately".
Conte described the attack on Joly as "squadrista".
"It shows, once again, the need to strengthen democratic antibodies every day to fight hatred, intolerance and neo-fascist violence," Conte continued via X.
"It is a serious and unacceptable episode, but it is not an isolated case: the alarm bells about some anti-democratic drifts in our country have already rung several times.
"The political world and healthy parties have the task of intervening to put an end to these delirious regurgitations of arrogance and violence.
"My solidarity and that of the M5S goes to Joly and the entire editorial staff (of La Stampa)".
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