New threats to Paolo Berizzi now under police protection
A threatening banner on the motorway against the author of the investigative book, NazItalia, followed by a raid in Padua during the presentation of the book
Within a few weeks, the journalist Paolo Berizzi, editor of the daily newspaper La Repubblica and author of an investigation on the development of extreme right movements in Italy, has been subjected to unjustifiable personal attacks attributable to segments of the movements he was looking at.
The first episode took place during the night between the 14th and 15th May 2018 when a police patrol car found on the flyover at the Buguggiate junction on the A8 Milan-Varese motorway, a banner with the writing, “NazItalia: Comrade Paolo Berizzi”. The banner which the police removed was signed by the neo-Nazi group Do.Ra.
Thirteen days later, on the 28th May 2018 the La Repubblica newspaper published news of an incursion by activists of the right-wing movement Forza Nuova in the Feltrinelli bookshop in Padua where Berizzi was presenting his book on NazItalia. A group of individuals clad in black distributed leaflets with the title, “Infamitalia” and set up a base outside the bookshop. They then moved inside where the book presentation was taking place in the presence of the author and ostentatiously photographed Berizzi and the speakers.
The Italian national press federation (FNSI) expressed its support for the journalist in relation to both episodes.
Ossigeno has been involved with Paolo Berizzi in March 2017 when he was threatened by extreme right and neo-Nazi fringe groups (read here) and as a consequence the provincial branch of the journalists’ union decided to protect him with private security.
RDM
