Q8.10 III. Violations of Human Rights in Italy
Description
This article is from the Italy FAQ, by Gianluigi Sartori gg@angel.stanford.edu, Paolo Fiorini fiorini@telerobotics.jpl.nasa.gov with numerous contributions by others.
Q8.10 III. Violations of Human Rights in Italy
(Which violations of human rights occurred in Italy in recent times?)
The following information is taken from the 1994 Annual Report of Amnesty
International and is about 1993 events.
- The Secondigliano Prison
Since the end of 1992, lawyers, media and members of Parliment have received
reports denuncing systematic ill-treatments of prisoners by
prison officers. In April the chief of prison guards and five of his officers
were charged of various crimes related to those ill-treatments and had to
leave their office temporarily.
The chief of prison guards allegedly encouraged his agents to beat prisoners.
He also read the correspondence of the prisoners threatening them if they
would have not removed mention to ill-treatments in their letters.
In June more than a hundred agend were under investigation for these facts.
- Ill-treatment of non-EC citizens by members of security forces
There were other reports of ill-treatments by members of security forces
especially towards non-EC citizens. As an example the Report describes the
case of Mahrez Chanouf, Tunisian, and Salim Sfouli, Egyptian.
They were arrested on August 19th after a car chase.
Some anonymous witnesses phoned a local radio station denuncing that the two
men had been repeatedly beaten and kicked by more than ten agents for nearly
twenty minutes after being captured and handcuffed.
After being brought in front of a judge the two defendants declared that
they
were beaten by police officers after their arrest both in the street
and in the police station. During the trial four police officers testified
that the defendants had resisted the arrest, but a witness stated that the
two men were not opposing any resistance while being beaten by policemen.
At the end of the trial the two defendant were considered not guilty
of opposing resistance to the arrest and the four policemen were charged of
abuse of authority. The case was sent to the attorney office for further
investigation as the to defendants were also charged of having stolen a car.
(Were there recent positive developments in Italy as for the respect of
human rights?)
On October 5th 1994 the Italian Parliament abolished the death penalty from
the Wartime Penal Military Code. The death penalty is therefore completely
abolished in Italy. Italy is the 54th total abolitionist country.
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