Rochefort-en-Terre (France) (AFP)

"Release Vincenzo" ... Since they learned of the arrest on Thursday of Vincenzo Vecchi, former anti-capitalist Italian activist, his friends grouped together distribute posters and organize in the Morbihan to try to prevent his extradition to Italy.

Laurence, Malou, Jean-Baptiste, Jean-Pierre, Gaëlle, Mireille and the others ... They are 50, 80, even more, the members of the collective, constituted in the emergency Saturday night to try to prevent "to deliver Vincenzo Salvini ", Italian Minister of the Interior and Head of the League (far right).

Sentenced to 12 years and six months in prison in Italy in 2012 for "devastation and ransacking" of property during the G8 summit in Genoa in 2001, and for taking part in an anti-fascist protest enamelled with violence and unauthorized in Milan in 2006, the 46-year-old turned house painter was arrested under two European arrest warrants. He was detained pending his appearance in Rennes on Wednesday for extradition.

At first amazed, his friends, who knew him only by his first name and did not know everything about his past, say they are outraged by what happens to him.

"Since I know he was arrested because he was fighting against fascism, I love him even more," says Mireille, tears in his eyes.

Described as "a very pretty boy, full of humor", Vincenzo settled eight years ago near Rochefort-en-terre, elected village "favorite of the French" in 2016. "Discreet, extremely friendly, very loyal , a bit intellectual "he loves to read, to play bass, to fish, to walk and willingly renders service to those who ask him. He is above all a very active volunteer in the community and cultural café of the village, "La Pente", created in 2004 to reweave the social bond in rural areas.

"He is not a political activist but an activist with values ​​of solidarity and humanism," says Jean-Pierre, his musician companion.

Malou, crepe maker and current companion of Vincenzo, sees in him a "superhero, a brave man, who left his place of life, his daughter, for his ideas".

- "Disproportionate sentence" -

For Malou as for others, the conviction of Vincenzo is considered "disproportionate" in relation to the alleged facts.

"When we knew the charges, we identified with him and we thought that it could have been us," says Jean-Pierre, who refutes pejorative stereotypes vis-à-vis his friend , "especially the pejorative term of activist".

"We do not want him to become the hunting trophy for Salvini's minister," says Jean-Baptiste.

"Vincenzo was sentenced on the basis of a law passed in 1930 under Mussolini which allowed disproportionate sentences recognizing the possibility of moral complicity," he said, adding that the justice had not retained the use of weapons by destination.

"We do not blame Vincenzo for specific fact, but simply the fact of having been present", continues the Italian ceramist. And to recall that the Genoa G8, which has been heavily condemned by the European Court of Human Rights because of police violence against protesters, some of which have been equated with "acts of torture" remained "an open wound in Italy".

"I am honored to have participated as a free man in a day of protest against a capitalist economy," said Vincenzo Vecchi in his first trial, according to La Republicca.

According to the Italian media, Vincenzo Vecchi belonged to the anarchist movement of Milan and is considered as the organizer of the violence committed in Genoa, the one that "pushed the others to act", with militants who "furrowed the city hooded by destroying and burning banks, cars, a supermarket and Marassi prison ". His group was called the "Bloc Noir".

In an attempt to help him, his friends set up working groups and called themselves "in a permanent meeting". "I can not do that anymore, we do not know if we'll do it but we do it for its pride and ours," says Laurence.

© 2019 AFP