Killing Giulio Regeni - again
Résumé
Italy's far right appears to have found a new cause: the unsolved murder of Giulio Regeni.
The death of the young Italian researcher, who was killed under murky circumstances in Egypt in 2016, sparked a tense diplomatic standoff between Rome and Cairo.
It shocked a majority of Italians at the time. Across the country, local governments raised banners calling for “Verità per Giulio Regeni” (“truth for Giulio Regeni”). It remains a fevered topic of speculation and outrage for many.
But for Italy's League party, the case has become a different kind of rallying cry. Across Italy, far-right mayors are now taking down the banners in a symbolic gesture calculated to confirm a nationalist worldview that distrusts outsiders.
In local elections in June, the historically leftist northern Italian city of Ferrara fell to the far right. As soon as the results were in, supporters of the newly elected mayor Alan Fabbri climbed the stairs of the municipal palace and covered the yellow banner about Regeni with the party's own flag. [...]