Italy election: Meloni turns to Zelenskyj after victory – “Hold on to the faith”
Created: 09/28/2022, 11:24 am
By: Bettina Menzel, Bedrettin Bölükbasi
The ultra-right Giorgia Meloni triumphed in Italy's parliamentary elections.
The party leader of the far-right Fratelli d'Italia assures Ukraine of "loyal support".
The news ticker.
Weber
defends
Berlusconi
-
Support
: "Profoundly European power"
First
election results
from
Italy
: post-fascists win parliamentary elections.
Right-wing alliance reaches 43 percent.
This
news ticker
on the consequences of the
Italian elections
is constantly being updated.
Update from September 28, 7:13 a.m .:
After her election victory in Italy, Giorgia Meloni assured Ukraine of full support, even under a new government she led.
The party leader of the far-right Fratelli d'Italia and likely future head of government in Rome wrote to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Twitter on Tuesday evening: "You know that you can count on our loyal support for the cause of the freedom of the Ukrainian people.
Stay strong and hold on to the faith.”
Previously, Zelenskyy had tweeted Meloni congratulations on the election success and thanked the Italians for their help after the Russian attack.
After the Russian invasion of Ukraine a good seven months ago, the incumbent Prime Minister Mario Draghi spoke out clearly in favor of the country's support and arms deliveries to Kyiv.
Lega boss Matteo Salvini could get nothing when it comes to the distribution of ministerial posts in Italy
Update from September 27, 11:40 a.m .:
Two days after the parliamentary elections in Italy, there is speculation as to who could get which ministerial post in the future government.
One of the most prominent allies of the head of the far-right Fratelli d'Italia and leader of the right-wing coalition, Giorgia Meloni, could get nothing when the key posts are distributed: Lega boss Matteo Salvini.
At the very least, the head of the right-wing populist party is unlikely to be given back his former post as interior minister, as reported by the daily newspapers
La Repubblica
and
Corriere della Sera
.
From Meloni's point of view, the Ministry of the Interior is therefore out of the question for Salvini, because he has to answer in court for deprivation of liberty and abuse of office in the case of the sea rescue ship "Open Arms".
President Sergio Mattarella may object,
La Repubblica
wrote .
The civil sea rescuers were not assigned a port to dock in August 2019 and were blocked off the Italian island of Lampedusa with up to 150 people on board.
From Salvini's point of view, Italy was not responsible at the time.
Instead of Salvini, his former office boss Matteo Piantedosi or the former prefect of Rome, Giuseppe Pecoraro, are now being discussed.
According to Corriere della Sera
, Meloni stressed that the results were "clear"
in view of the negotiations with her allies on the distribution of posts .
According to the newspaper, she stated: "I will not make any compromises and will not offer myself for games." One does not want to sacrifice any program items in order to fulfill ministry requests, for example.
They are "serious" and offer "maximum cooperation".
"But we've come this far and we don't want to lose face now," Meloni said, according to the Italian daily.
Either you do "good things" or it doesn't make sense to form a new government, the election winner went on to explain.
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Giorgia Meloni has won the Italian elections.
But there shouldn't be a key post for Matteo Salvini.
© IMAGO/Massimo Di Vita
Italy election: Berlusconi assures "pro-European and transatlantic profile" of new government
Update from September 27, 11 a.m.:
After the electoral success of the radical right, Italian ex-Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi tried to reassure the country’s international partners.
As a member of the European People's Party (EPP), his conservative Forza Italia party feels obliged to "guarantee the international profile, the pro-European profile and the transatlantic profile of the next government," Berlusconi said in a video message on Instagram.
"A good relationship with our historic allies in the United States and the main countries of the European Union is essential for Italy's future," added Berlusconi.
Forza Italia ran in the parliamentary elections in alliance with the far-right Fratelli d'Italia and the right-wing populist Lega.
In this constellation, she is striving for participation in the government.
However, Giorgia Meloni's EU-skeptical Fratelli, who were by far the strongest, should set the tone.
In view of the election result (around 8 percent), the influence of Forza Italia as a junior partner is likely to be limited.
After the Italian election: Weber defends Berlusconi support - "profoundly European force"
Update from September 27, 7.10 a.m .:
The chairman of the EPP parliamentary group in the Bundestag, Manfred Weber (CSU), has again defended his support for Silvio Berlusconi in the parliamentary elections in Italy.
Berlusconi's Forza Italia is a "deeply European force," said Weber on Monday evening in ARD's "Tagesthemen".
With a view to Markus Söder, Weber explained: He understands that the CSU chairman sets the accent “from a Bavarian, from a German point of view”.
Weber, on the other hand, has “European responsibility”.
The EPP boss wanted "that we keep Italy on board and therefore my support for Forza Italia".
He gave the election winners in Rome a “leap of faith” with a view to forming a government.
EPP boss Manfred Weber (CSU) commented on the ARD's "Tagesthemen" on the election in Italy.
©Screenshot/ARD
The 50-year-old had taken part in campaign events at Forza Italia in the run-up to the election.
At the beginning of the week, several CSU politicians criticized Weber.
Party leader Markus Söder asked him to maintain "firewalls to right-wing extremist groups".
Weber then said that he was the first to supply stones for such a wall.
Italy election: Spain's foreign minister warns of populist tendencies
Update from September 26, 8:07 p.m .:
The USA, Russia and Poland have already commented on the results of the parliamentary elections in Italy.
Spain's socialist foreign minister, José Manuel Albares, has now warned of populist tendencies in Europe given the shift to the right.
"In times of uncertainty, they always spread and they always end in disaster because they offer short-winded and simple answers to very complicated questions," he told the Europa Press news agency on Monday.
Giorgia Meloni's far-right party won more than 26 percent of the votes in Italy's parliamentary elections on Sunday.
Albare emphasized that he does not expect developments in Spain like in Italy.
The situation in the two countries is “very different”.
Russia welcomes 'political forces capable of stepping outside the mainstream'
Update from September 26, 6:46 p.m .:
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov did not want to comment in more detail on the parliamentary elections in Italy on Monday.
This is a “purely internal matter”.
However, Russia welcomes all political forces "that are able to leave the framework of the established mainstream, which is characterized by hatred of Russia, and show more objectivity and constructiveness in relations with our country," Peskov said after a report the agency Interfax.
Election winner Giorgia Meloni is considered pro-Western in foreign policy and a supporter of NATO.
She emphasizes her support for Russia's attacked Ukraine.
However, their alliance also includes forces that have expressed themselves as pro-Russian.
Above all, Russia relies on those politicians in the EU who are campaigning for an end to Western sanctions against Moscow.
Poland's President Duda slams criticism of Giorgia Meloni's election victory as "arrogant"
Update from September 26, 5:28 p.m .:
After the victory of the post-fascist Fratelli d'Italia in the parliamentary elections in Italy, the USA had already announced that it would seek close cooperation with the new government.
Poland's President Andrzej Duda, who criticized the election victory of Giorgia Meloni and her right-wing radical party as a sign of arrogance, also spoke out.
"How much sense of superiority, arrogance and contempt for democratic rules does one have to have to say about the result of another country's elections (...): 'The wrong person won!'" Duda wrote on Twitter on Monday .
Meloni's party won more than 26 percent of the votes in Italy's parliamentary elections on Sunday.
With her right-wing alliance partners Lega and Forza Italia, the nationalist will have a clear absolute majority in parliament due to the peculiarities of Italian electoral law.
Polish President Duda is officially non-party, as the constitution provides for.
He originally came from the ranks of the national conservative governing party PiS.
Leading PiS politicians gave a positive assessment of the outcome of the election.
Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki congratulated Meloni on the "great victory" that night.
First election results from Italy confirm the victory of the post-fascist Fratelli d'Italia
First message: Rome/Washington – The general elections in Italy were followed with excitement throughout Europe.
After all, a shift to the right by the government was feared.
The first results finally confirmed what was suggested by polls in the weeks leading up to the election: the right-wing camp around Giorgia Meloni, leader of the post-fascist Fratelli d'Italia (FDI), emerged victorious.
The first reaction to the election in Italy came from the USA.
Italy election: USA wants cooperation with new Italian government
The USA is counting on close cooperation with the future government in Rome and wants to continue supporting Ukraine and protecting human rights.
"We are eager to work with the Italian government on our common goals: to support a free and independent Ukraine, to respect human rights and to build a sustainable economic future," US Secretary of State Antony Blinken wrote Monday (September 26) in the Short message service Twitter.
"Italy is an extremely important ally, a strong democracy and a valued partner," Blinken added.
Italy election: Ultra-right Meloni wins - she gets a good 43 percent of the votes
According to projections, the far-right Giorgia Meloni and her post-fascist FDI party received around a quarter of the votes in the parliamentary elections in Italy, making it the strongest force.
With her allies, the right-wing Lega and the conservative Forza Italia (FI), Meloni received a good 43 percent of the votes, which should be enough for an absolute majority of seats in the House of Representatives and Senate.
Meloni is likely to become the first woman to head an Italian government.
But you still have a difficult government formation ahead of you.
(bb with AFP)
