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13 January 2019The former terrorist of the Proletarians armed for communism Cesare Battisti was captured in Bolivia at 5pm yesterday (10pm in Italy) by local agents with input from Italian investigators. He walked in a street of Santa Cruz de La Sierra, a populous city in the Bolivian hinterland. He did not attempt the escape, he replied to the agents in Portuguese, denying having documents, then he was taken to the barracks.The federal deputy and son of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro was among the first to break the news and immediately wanted to send a message to the Minister of the Interior: "Matteo Salvini, the 'small gift' is coming", wrote Eduardo Bolsonaro on Twitter.
The news of the arrest was confirmed by the Italian ambassador in Brazil, Antonio Bernardini, who celebrated the capture of the former terrorist fugitive from December stating: "It has been taken! Democracy is stronger than terrorism".
The escape to avoid extradition
Battisti had lost the traces of himself after the decision of the magistrate of the Supreme Federal Court (Stf) Brazilian Luis Fux who on December 13 had ordered his arrest for "danger of escape" in view of a possible extradition to Italy, granted in following days by the outgoing president Michel Temer before the inauguration of Jair Bolsonaro on January 1st 2019. It was Bolsonaro himself who gave a decisive change of pace to the affair, expressing himself before being elected in favor of the return to Battisti's Italy and reversing thus the decision of the then President Lula da Silva to grant political asylum to the former terrorist sentenced to life imprisonment in Italy for four murders.
The video before the capture, walk in the street
Beard, sunglasses, jeans and blue t-shirt. Thus, in a video released by the State Police, Cesare Battisti appears while walking in the street just before the capture. Battisti is filmed as he passes in front of an emporium. He does not know that he is being watched and followed up by, as a tweet from the State Police, "police team # Criminalpol #Antiterrorismo and #Digos Milano with Italian intelligence collaboration" remembers. Then the arrest by the Bolivian police.
🎥 #CesareBattisti filmed just before capture
Police team #Criminalpol #Antiterrorismo and #Digos Milan with Italian intelligence collaboration followed him to the arrest by the Bolivian police @INTERPOL_HQ pic.twitter.com/adBu9iRvX2
He did not resist
When the Bolivian agents turned to him and stopped him, he did not attempt to flee or resist and responded in Portuguese. This is how Cesare Battisti was blocked, once the policemen, on input from Italian colleagues, were certain that it was the former Pac terrorist. Italian investigators had already been in Bolivia for a week and after circumscribing the area in which Battisti was located they started following him. However, before intervening, all the comparative activities and visual feedback were made until the reasonable assurance was given that it was he. At that point, yesterday, the Bolivian policemen were called in, who stopped him in the middle of the street.
To the requests of the agents to supply the documents, Battisti replied in Portuguese saying he did not have them and only when they brought him to the police offices - where he would still be - did he supply his Brazilian document.
Controlled for years by Italian intelligence
In all these years in which he lived in Brazil, we learn from sources in the Interior Ministry, Battisti was kept under control by Italian intelligence, which never lost sight of him. But only with the election of Bolsonaro have contacts intensified with the Brazilian police forces.
After the escape, the pool of Criminalpol and Antiterrorism investigators who arrived in Brazil to collaborate with Brazilian colleagues took a few days to pick up the threads and find the right track, until he tracked down Battisti in Bolivia. The certainty that he was the police and intelligence had her a week ago and from that moment all the details of the blitz that was triggered yesterday in agreement with the local authorities were planned.
Battisti is currently being held by the Bolivian authorities but there are also Italian policemen with him, waiting for the plane that had already left Italy to arrive.
Italian plane already flying to South America
An Italian government plane also carrying men from the Aise - the foreign intelligence agency whose contribution was fundamental to the arrest of Battisti - and police investigators have already taken off for the South America. The arrival is scheduled for this afternoon (Italian time) but this, underline government sources, does not mean that the plane will leave immediately. Some procedures still need to be completed.
Brazilian plane flying to Bolivia, returns tomorrow
A Brazilian federal police plane is flying to Bolivia. He should return with Cesare Battisti on board tomorrow. This was reported by sources close to the Bolsonaro government, according to the Brazilian media. Bolivia would provide for an immediate expulsion and the former Pac terrorist would be accompanied on the Brazilian flight to Brazil, from here take the Italian plane for extradition.
Identified thanks to Pg Milan surveys
It would have been the investigations arranged and coordinated by the Milan Public Prosecutor's Office that led to identifying Cesare Battisti in Bolivia, arrested in the past few hours in Santa Cruz de La Sierra. As far as has been learned, Advocate General Nunzia Gatto, immediately after the escape of the former Pac terrorist from Brazil, has started investigations entrusted to Digos. A system of sophisticated interceptions and the collaboration of the Bolivian police would contribute to its capture.
He had false documents
Cesare Battisti had false documents in his pocket when he was arrested yesterday in Santa Cruz de laSerra. This is what results from the investigations conducted by Digos investigators and coordinated by the deputy attorney general of Milan, Antonio Lamanna, who deals with the case of the former terrorist.
# 13January #Bolivia team of Italian policemen with Bolivian police identified and captured #CesareBattisti
The activity of the Italian anti-terrorist police officers #Dcpp and of the International Police Cooperation Service #Scip #Criminalpol pic.twitter.com/CdAVZKpEY4
"No life sentence applies"
"In Brazil there is no life sentence, it is forbidden by the Constitution: this is why Italy is committed to ensuring that it will not be applied to Battisti. This is the result of the agreement, of the so-called 'accepted condition', concluded on 5 and 6 October 2017. Therefore, once extradited, Battisti will be subject to a maximum sentence of 30 years ". Explains the former director of the Ministry of Justice, Raffaele Piccirillo, who directly followed the case when he was Andrea Orlando.
"The authority that had to grant the extradition, that is Brazil, has affixed the condition tied to the life sentence and the Minister of Justice has accepted it," says Piccirillo, explaining that this is linked to the asymmetry between the Brazilian judicial system , which "does not provide for life imprisonment and indeed considers it unconstitutional and the Italian one, where on the other hand life imprisonment is still formally envisaged", even if in fact it no longer finds concrete application. Without this agreement, the go-ahead to extradition, whose procedure had already been completed, would have stalled. "Thirty years - adds Piccirillo - are the sanction limits accepted by Brazil and on which there is commitment". A roof that could be revised downwards? "On a technical level - explains the magistrate - it will be possible to assess whether Battisti can take advantage of penitentiary benefits, such as the early release provided for in article 4 bis of the penitentiary system. This article, however, came into force after the conviction of Battisti , which in any case will be able to benefit after having served half of the sentence, so I think there is nothing immediate, we talk about at least 15 years of time ".
President Bolsonaro celebrates on Twitter: justice will be done
"Congratulations to those responsible for capturing the terrorist Cesare Battisti. Finally, justice will be done for the Italian murderer and ideal partner of one of the most corrupt governments that have ever existed in the world (PT)". Thus on Twitter the president of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, referring to the government of former Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who on December 31, 2010, on his last day in office, blocked extradition to Italy by decree. Then, in a second tweet: "Congratulations and always counts on us Minister Salvini". And the vice-premier replies: "Thank you very much President"
Mattarella: be delivered soon to Italy
"The President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, expressed his satisfaction at the arrest in Bolivia of the fugitive Cesare Battisti. Mattarella hopes that Battisti will be promptly handed over to the Italian justice system, so that he pays the penalty for the serious criminals he has guilty of Italy and that the same happens for all the fugitives who fled abroad ". This is what we read in a press release from the Quirinale Press Office.
Conte: finally justice for families
"The Santoro, Torregiani, Sabbadin, Campagna families will finally be able to obtain justice. The capture and expulsion of Cesare Battisti are a result expected for over forty years, which we owed especially to them, as well as to the other victims of his criminal actions" . This was written by Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte on Facebook, commenting on the capture in Bolivia of Battisti. "The choral and persevering efforts of our intelligence services, our police forces and Interpol, the collaboration of the Brazilian and Bolivian authorities and the determination of this Government are finally being rewarded," he added. "One of our planes is traveling to Bolivia where it will land at about 5:00 pm (Italian time), with the aim of taking Battisti and bringing it back to Italy. Waiting for us here will be our prisons so that we can atone for sentences. to life imprisonment that the Italian courts have imposed on him at the time with res judicata, certainly not because of his political ideas, but because of the four crimes committed and the various crimes related to armed struggle and terrorism ", underlines the premier.
Salvini: come on, in jail for life
Cesare Battisti is a "criminal who does not deserve a comfortable life on the beach but to end his days in jail". This is what the deputy premier and Interior Minister Matteo Salvini said, posting on the social media a photo of Battisti dominated by the words "the pacchia is over". "I thank the Italian and foreign law enforcement agencies for their great work - says Salvini - the Police, Interpol, Aise and all those who worked for the capture of Cesare Battisti". The minister's thanks are also for the Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro and the new Brazilian government "for the changed political climate which, together with a positive international scenario where Italy has become a protagonist again, have allowed this success expected for years, thanks to the authorities Bolivians and the collaboration of other friendly countries ". Cesare Battisti was "pampered by the left half of the world" and "for too long he enjoyed life". Salvini always says that. "My first thought - he adds - goes to the families of the victims of this murderer, who for too long has enjoyed a life he has cowardly taken away from others".
"I hope we talk about hours, because in the past this infamous one has accustomed us to jokes of all kinds. I hope that he arrives in jail in Italy as soon as possible and will be short-lived, there is full cooperation with the Bolivian and Brazilian authorities, there is it was a wonderful team effort ". Thus the Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister returned to Rtl 102.5 on the timing of the extraction of Cesare Battisti.
The arrest of the former terrorist, adds the minister, "was not a gift to me but to all the Italians. Bolsonaro was a word: it was one of his first commitments after the election of the Republic in Brazil. I repeat, there are too many dead and wounded who have been waiting for justice for too many years ". "The international political climate has changed - he concludes - honor, justice, respect, the certainty of rules and punishment return to count for something".
Moavero: at work for rapid extradition
"This is an act of justice against the hateful crimes of terrorism, a duty towards those who were killed or wounded and towards their families", now the work continues so that extradition to Italy can take place as quickly as possible. Thus Foreign Minister Enzo Moavero commented on the arrest in Bolivia of the former terrorist of the Pac Cesare Battisti. Moavero therefore thanked "all those who worked for this purpose".
The result, the minister explained, depended on a joint and determined action by the authorities of Bolivia and Brazil, together with the competent Italian authorities, including our diplomatic representatives. The Minister, a Farnesina statement said, has confirmed that the work continues so that extradition to Italy can take place as quickly as possible and added that "at this moment, all the victims of terrorism are affected, even by the of today's international terrorism that still affects so many innocents ".
Bonafede: justice is done, now in Italy
"The long flight of Cesare Battisti is over. My thoughts go to the families of his victims: Antonio Santoro, Pierluigi Torregiani, Lino Sabbadin, Andrea Campagna. To them I can say that, finally, justice is done!". The Minister of Justice Alfonso Bonafede writes in a long post on Facebook stating that "now Cesare Battisti will be returned to Italy". "The tension of the last hours and the due reserve - he adds - can leave room for satisfaction for having achieved an expected result 25 years". "Battisti in Italy will have to pay for his sentence: those who make mistakes must pay and even Battisti will pay", adds Bonafede, who continues: "The time elapsed has not alleviated the wounds that Battisti has left in the families of its victims and in the Italian people, as well as it has not diminished the human and institutional desire to obtain justice.
I thank the Italian and Brazilian authorities. I thank Interpol, for the non-stop commitment and the timing with which it acted. And I also thank the Bolivian authorities ".
"But a special thanks - emphasizes the minister - goes to all those who at the Ministry of Justice have pursued this result since 1993. Between France, Mexico and Brazil, the guard has never been lowered, there has never been surrender before to the difficulties, even when everything seemed lost. Even in recent months, contacts with Brazil have been constant Perseverance is the mother of success The ministry I have the honor of representing is made up of unstoppable men and women who every day they work for the proper functioning of justice.I like to think - he concludes - that this tenacity is that of an entire people, the Italian one.
Gentiloni: finally victims will have justice
"Baptists arrested tonight in Bolivia. Finally the victims of terrorism will have justice". The former prime minister of the Pd Paolo Gentiloni writes it on Twitter.
Renzi: good news for all Italians
"The arrest of Cesare Battisti in Bolivia is good news. All Italians, without any distinction of political color, want a murderer like this to be brought back to our country as soon as possible to serve his sentence in an Italian prison. Today is a nice day". This was written by Matteo Renzi on Twitter.
Tajani: discounts the penalty without any concession
"Cesare Battisti is sent back to Italy as soon as possible and he pays the penalty without any concession in his favor. A red terrorist who has made fun of the victims, their families and the whole of Italy deserves to stay in jail!" The president of the European Parliament Antonio Tajani writes it on Twitter.
Alberto Torregiani: "One of the most positive news in recent years"
"I think it's the right time": this is what Cesare Battisti arrested in Bolivia, Alberto Torregiani, son of the jeweler killed in 1979 by the Pac in a shootout in which he himself was wounded and lost the use of his legs. "We what we have always wanted is that those who made a mistake always pay the penalties that they accused him of."
Sabbadin: I don't forgive, you discount the penalty
"Forgiveness is not talked about, it is a word that Cesare Battisti must learn". Thus stated Adriano Sabbadin, son of Lino killed by Cesare Battisti in Santa Maria di Sala (Venice) on 16 February 1979 because he was found guilty, by a commando of Armed Proletarians for communism, of having defended himself during a robbery. "It is a moment of satisfaction after 40 years of waiting - adds Adriano - we hope that it is the right time and that Battisti finally discounts the penalty it deserves"