The new MEP Ilaria Salis is free. The Hungarian police left her home in Budapest after removing her electronic bracelet. We learn this from legal sources. A few days after her election among the ranks of Avs, she was released from home detention. The woman is accused of having attacked some participants of a neo-Nazi demonstration in Budapest on 11 February 2023. The crimes at the center of the proceedings carry a sentence of up to 24 years in prison.
“Finally! We are happy with the news that comes from Budapest, the MEP Ilaria Salis can now return to Italy and will be able to carry out its new function for which hundreds of thousands of voters have indicated it”, say Angelo Bonelli and Nicola Fratoianni of Avs in a joint note. “Our thanks go to everyone and all those, who like us, in these months they were outraged and not resigned to the terrible condition in which she was kept in Orban’s prisons. Now he will be able to defend the civil and social rights of the weakest together with us. We are waiting for you.”
Ilaria Salis elected MEP
Ilaria Salis was elected in the European elections. “Ilaria received 170 thousand preferences, 120 thousand in the north west and the rest in Sardinia and Sicily”, said her father Roberto Salis at the end of the counting of the ballots. If Hungary requests the revocation of its immunity as an MEP, as announced by the Hungarian government’s chief of staff Gergely Gulyás, the European Parliament will have the final say.
And what do they say in Strasbourg? The European Parliament “does not comment on individual cases. Beyond the general provisions established by the electoral law”, the immunity of MEPs “is mainly defined by national electoral laws. I invite you to contact the Italian authorities. Based on the provisions in force, an elected MEP candidate benefits from the immunities provided for in Article 9.2 of the Protocol on Privileges and Immunities, but we do not comment on individual cases” said European Parliament Deputy Chief Spokesperson Delphine Colard.
Ilaria Salis: “Ready to do my part”
The MEP teacher will enjoy immunity. “I still can’t believe it or describe my emotion. I will never be able to thank enough all the people who supported me with their vote – he wrote in a post on Instagram, after receiving the news of the election -. My my first thought goes to all the people detained in Italy and abroad and their rights. To anyone who fights for freedom and equality and finds themselves suffering injustices”. “Anti-fascism, as well as a human value and a political perspective, is also a resistant and supportive community. We have demonstrated – he wrote – that solidarity is not an empty slogan, but something concrete and tangible. A power that, if we believe in it and if we want, it can really improve the world. While the radical right advances throughout Europe it is necessary to fight to radically change the current state of affairs. I’m ready to do my part“.
