Gregoretti trial, here are Conte and Toninelli’s tweets on file

Published on: 12/12/2020 5:55 PM

by the correspondent Elvira Terranova
“The Strasbourg Court also gives the government the right thing and Sea Watch bad. We must guarantee the migrants adequate food, care and assistance. And that is what we are doing. But we have no obligation when disembarking. And we will not let them. disembark all the way to the EU. It hits a hit. Keep it up. ” It is January 29, 2019 and the then Minister of Transport Danilo Toninelli writes this tweet, after another fight with the Sea Watch ship with hundreds of migrants on board. The publication, along with other ‘tweets’ from the former minister that was heard today at the preliminary hearing on the Gregoretti case in the Bicocca bunker in Catania, was produced, according to Adnkronos, by the defense of Salvini, the lawyer Giulia Bongiorno, in the audience. There are a dozen tweets and interviews released by Toninelli when he was Minister of Transport. He also produced a publication by Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte.

Today, during his deposition, as Bongiorno herself explained at a press conference, Toninelli would have expressed “many I do not remember” especially in the matter of another ship, the Spanish NGO Open Arms. “I was very embarrassed for him, I don’t remember,” Bongiorno said. Toninelli today would not have remembered, among other things, some isolated cases of landing “because they were all different.” And of “not having had any role in the landing restrictions.” But lawyer Bongiorno showed Toninelli the tweets produced by the defense. Here they are: “There is someone who favors the departure of the ships of death, but the government of change is no longer willing to accept this state of affairs. The Netherlands immediately knew the true intentions of Sea Watch”, writes Toninelli on 26 January of 2019, again talking about the Sea Watch ship. In this way, the defense wants to show that the elections of the then Interior Minister Matteo Salvini were shared with the entire government, including, in fact, the former Minister of Infrastructure Danilo Toninelli.

On January 30, 2019, another tweet from Toninelli, again in the process against Matteo Salvini, accused of hijacking the Gregoretti ship. “The EU has relented and the Sea Watch immigrants will be distributed in seven different countries, including France, Luxembourg and Germany. Prepared for a fair division of responsibilities. Italy is raising its head in Europe again.” Going back in time there is another tweet by Toninelli produced by the defense of Salvini: “For some hours there has been a ship with 450 people on board sailing in the SAR of Malta – he wrote – By the law of the sea it is Malta that must send possess ships and open the port. Our Coast Guard will be able to act if necessary in support, but Malta does its duty immediately. ” It was July 13, 2018.

Also on record is a post of Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte. We are on July 14, 2018 when the Prime Minister, in the Conte 1 government, wrote on Twitter: “France and Malta will respectively take 50 of the 450 migrants transshipped in the two military ships, the accessions of other European countries will soon arrive” ” And “An important result – wrote the prime minister – obtained after a day of telephone and written exchanges that I had with the 27 European leaders. Italy is finally beginning to be really listened to. “The letter sent to the heads of state and government of the 27 countries of the European Council is also mailed. That same day, July 14, 2018, Toninelli congratulates Conte and writes on Twitter: “More results on migrants in 45 days than in many years. Congratulations to Conte. The government of change is overturning the molds. With this regained international credibility. Italy will no longer be alone. “

Another tweet is dated August 15, 2019 when Toninelli writes: “I had already signed the Salvini decree that prohibits the entry, transit and parking of the Open Arms in Italian waters. I had signed again this time to reiterate that those who do not respects the law of the sea, he cannot disembark in Italy. That decree was rejected by the TAR and issued another identical one for the TAR to reject again after 5 minutes. And unlike Salvini, who seeks only easy consent, we acted with a sense of state and concreteness “.

On August 20, Toninelli, in the midst of the crisis with Salvini, wrote: “We continue working to unblock the Open Arms situation as soon as possible. There is an important political fact to record: whereas previously the other European countries gave the will to welcome a part of the migrants, now instead they tell us first to disembark them in Lampedusa and then we will see. They are beginning to turn their backs on us and this only has one responsible: Matteo Salvini who has weakened the government and consequently our position in Europe “.

Going back in time, on June 11, 2018, the tones were totally different, from sharing with Salvini. Here is another tweet from Toninelli prepared by the defense of the former deputy prime minister: “We thank Spain and Prime Minister Sánchez for having decided to welcome the Aquarius ship. It is the sign of a new wind of solidarity and sharing that is blowing in Europe on this emergency. . We have just settled in and the music is already changing ”. And he even quotes Salvini: “With Ministers Moavero and Salvini we will bring the issue of cooperation to Europe.”

Then a year later, after Papeete, the music changes. On August 20, 2019, another tweet in which Toninelli wrote: “Thanks to our interlocutors these days, Spain announced the dispatch of its own military ship to transport Open Arms migrants to the Iberian coasts. Well, good news, the result of our work, aimed at other European countries not turning to the other side, but rather jointly managing, together with Italy, the migratory phenomenon ”.

And today, in a bunker classroom frozen by the absence of heating, as Salvini himself stressed several times later in the press conference, Toninelli and Salvini, the ex-allies met again, but this time in opposite positions.