A report from Italian Indymedia

"Last night (Nov 15th) twenty people, part of new global movements in the South
of Italy, have been imprisoned with very heavy and fascistic accusations:
'Subversive association and political conspiracy finalized to disrupt
Government functions, subversive propaganda and violent subversion of the
economic order of the State'. "Francesco Caruso, leader of the "No Global Network" from Naples and one of
the main speakers of Italian Disobedients, has been arrested and deported
to the prison of maximum security of Trani, reserved to Red Brigades
terrorists. Together with Caruso, Italian Digos (political police) arrested
Francesco Cirillo and Giuseppe Fonzino, leaders of the movement in Cosenza
and Taranto. Other 22 people have been searched and investigated within the
same inquiry coordinated by the special investigative group of the Ros
(Carabinieri) and the Procura of Cosenza.

According to the PM, Caruso, Cirillo and Fonzino are supposedly the heads
of a subversive association called "Network of the Rebel South". The
Network would have organized the riots of Naples in March 2001 (during the
Global Forum organized by the previous Government) and in Genoa during the
G8 Summit. In this circumstance the Network would have organized a "red
block" to be dislocated behind the black bloc. The inquiry would
demonstrate clear relationships between the Network and the black bloc.

Beside the detectives speculations (explained in an ordinance of 360
pages), the arrests and the particular gravity of the accusations (used in
the 70s to fight terrorism) are clearly an intimidating act after the
European Social Forum success which gathered last week 700,000
demonstrators in Florence against global war. The evidence of the movement
vitality is given by the fact that few hours after the arrests presidium
and sit-in of solidarity have been organized all over the country. And in
the next days initiatives are planned in various spots and under various forms.

The signs of a growing economic and social crisis in Italy are everywhere:
FIAT, the Italian car brand, has announced recently the cut of 8,100
workplaces and the veiled intention to sell to General Motors within two
years. Many observers state that the dismantling of the Italian car
industry will involve about 30,000 workers, including the external small
factories which fabricate components for FIAT.

The crisis is particularly heavy in Sicily, where the closure of the
implant of Termini Imerese will dramatically impact the overall
occupational balance, already under-developed. The workers from Termini
Imerese are striking since one week, blocking the ports and the airport of
Palermo and Messina, cutting out the island from the rest of the country.
The workers are also menacing the Government to increase the form of the
protests, if Fiat will not present an industrial plan of investments and
re-launch of the production.

Sicily is also the region where the Government lead by Silvio Berlusconi
got 61 deputies on 61. Therefore, it is highly symbolic that in the Region
where the people believed most the Government promises, the hard reality
ground is breaking them into pieces. Beside this, the CGIL (the largest
European union, with 5 million members) was massively present at the
European Social Forum in Florence. The alliance between such a traditional
organization of the workers and the new global movement (rooted into
precarious, flexible, cognitive and "atypical" workers) is powerful and
potentially winning. The total control on media that Berlusconi is
exercising is unable to produce new consensus and to break into social
networks of solidarity and to delegitimate a movement where the
word-of-mouth and the Internet are powerful tools of organization and
resistance.

On a more general level, Italy is the EU country with the slowest growth in
2002 (0,4%). The Euro effect is eroding the buying power of the salary and
the public debt has started to run again. The level of corruption is
dramatically increasing. The new laws on "fake in balance" allowed
Berlusconi to cancel for prescription two of the trials in which he is
involved as an enterpreneur. The new law on "legitimate suspicion" will
facilitate enquired people to reject the natural judge and to move the
process elsewhere (Berlusconi is rejecting his judge in Milan for the
accusation of "magistrature corruption"). The personal and private use of
the political power, is unaccetable not only for the new global movement
but also for vast strata of the middle class, from school teacher to
drugstore managers, from journalists to little enterpreneurs of the North East.

But Berlusconi has no will to leave power. By keeping the control on
secret services (after the nominee of the new Minister of Foreign Affairs)
he sends a clear message. "I'm not quitting and i will use all the powers
at my disposal to accomplish the political project of P2" (the subversive
lobby of which Berlusconi was member): break the independence of the
magistrature, exercise a complete control over media and turn the Italian
democracy into a modern oligarchy. A project that millions of people are
contrasting day by day, disconnecting themselves by TV propaganda and fear
circuits and spreading consciousness and democratic participation.