In defense of borders, security, cultural identity, and the future, Italians and Europeans alike were called to a joint movement by Matteo Salvini, leader of the Italian right-wing League party, in a live video message broadcast on his social media on Tuesday evening.
Matteo Salvini announced that this year the League’s traditional gathering will be a two-day event.
On October 5, the youth are expected in Pontida: more than two thousand have already expressed their participation from all over Italy. Young people between the ages of 15 and 25 will discuss various topics ranging from education to the use of artificial intelligence, from cultural identity to the protection of the future.
On October 6, League politicians, voters, sympathizers, as well as European allies and supporters will join. Matteo Salvini specifically mentioned Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, and Geert Wilders, the leader of the Dutch Freedom Party. According to the League’s statement, André Ventura, the president of the Portuguese Chega party, and Marlene Svazek, vice president of the Austrian Freedom Party, which won in the Sunday elections, will be present. Marine Le Pen, leading the National Rally in France, and Jordan Bardella will send a video message to Pontida due to other national events, as will former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro.
Matteo Salvini emphasized that the League’s traditional meeting in Pontida, Lombardy, this year will be more than just a party rally. It will be a movement to declare that “defending borders is not a crime, but a duty.”
He reminded that the prosecutor’s office in Palermo, Sicily, called for a six-year prison sentence for him because as interior minister in 2019, he had stopped a Spanish civilian ship that wanted to dock on Italy’s shores. Salvini emphasized that the court will deliver a verdict in the coming weeks, perhaps even before the end of October. “If they don’t convict me, we will celebrate together. If they do, I won’t give up, I will continue to close Italy’s doors, because borders are the doors of our homes. (…) I am proud to have defended the homes of Italians,” he said.
He mentioned that over the past two weekends, one hundred thousand signatures were collected in the points set up on Italian streets and squares, where Italians, immigrants, and opposition voters also expressed their solidarity.
Matteo Salvini added: illegal immigration and the human trafficking that comes with it, with organizations demanding up to four thousand euros per head, then using the money for arms and drug trafficking, must be stopped.
He stated: the grandparents and fathers of Italians sacrificed their lives so that their country would not fall into foreign hands, and now Italian cities are in the hands of foreign criminals, violent offenders, and murderers. He added that there are twenty thousand illegal immigrant criminals in Italian prisons.
He said that there are many honest foreigners living, studying, working, and paying taxes in Italy, “whom I consider my brothers and sisters.” At the same time, he noted that the number of legally settled immigrants must not become a majority: “I say yes to integration, but up to a certain limit.”
He added that he does not support expediting or easing access to citizenship for immigrants. In his opinion, immigrant youth who have grown up in Italy – according to current practice – must continue to apply for citizenship after they turn 18.
Regarding the parliamentary victory of the Austrian Freedom Party, Matteo Salvini asked where and how those who see Nazis and fascists everywhere live.
“This is democracy. They are not neo-Nazis as the left claims, but people who care about their nation’s security, freedom, culture, and future.”
he stated.
At the beginning and end of his direct broadcast, Matteo Salvini identified peace as the biggest challenge of the year. He believed that the election of Donald Trump as President of the United States could put an end to the “damned conflict” in the Middle East and similarly to the war in Ukraine.
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