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      Italy’s Unity Government Nears Collapse After Confidence Vote

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      A confidence vote showed potentially fatal fractures in Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s grand coalition, as the anti-establishment Five Star Movement withheld support and set off a political crisis.ROME — The broad national unity government led by Prime Minister Mario Draghi, which has expanded Italy’s influence in Europe, guided it through a successful vaccination campaign and injected competence and confidence into the country, suddenly neared collapse on Thursday as it faced a rebellion from the remnants of Italy’s recent anti-establishment past.The revolt by the mostly imploded Five Star Movement, led by Mr. Draghi’s predecessor as prime minister, Giuseppe Conte, threatened to usher in the end of a period of political stability for Italy and thrust the country back into the familiar political turmoil that has paralyzed it for decades.Mr. Draghi had opted for the confidence vote early Thursday in an effort to call Mr. Conte’s bluff as he threatened to break with the government over a relief bill for soaring energy costs and new investments, which Five Star found inadequate. It turned out that, this time, Mr. Conte, who has made repeated threats to break with the government, was not bluffing. His party withheld its support in the confidence vote, but it was not immediately clear whether it would remain a part of the government.Though the government survived — by 172 to 39 — Mr. Draghi had made clear that he would not lead a unity government that had no unity. He is now expected to meet with the country’s president, Sergio Mattarella, to discuss next steps.Mr. Mattarella may ask Mr. Draghi to present a new political program to Parliament next week, or form a new government with a simple cabinet shuffle.Mr. Draghi could also choose to resign, forcing the president to ask a different person to try to form a new government or call for early elections.Five Star, whose support crumbled after a chaotic spell running the government and Mr. Draghi’s succession, would most likely suffer terribly in such elections, and many of its members of Parliament, who are loath to lose their paychecks and pensions, would be out of a job.But as the 2023 deadline for elections draws nearer, Five Star also has less to lose, and Mr. Draghi’s government is likely to face more internecine fighting and instability. So it is not entirely surprising that the threat came from Mr. Conte.Giuseppe Conte, a former prime minister and leader of the Five Star Movement, last week. He has made a habit of issuing ultimatums to the government.Massimo Percossi/EPA, via ShutterstockMr. Conte, a lawyer plucked from obscurity by Five Star and the League to lead the government in 2018, has struggled to find his footing as a political leader of what is left of Five Star.He is still bitter, members of Parliament say, over being pushed out as prime minister in 2021, when he was replaced by Mr. Draghi, and he is desperate to rebuild a party that has wasted away, hemorrhaging half of its support.The Five Star leader who brought him in as prime minister — Luigi Di Maio, the current foreign minister — quit the party last month, taking dozens of members with him. Mr. Di Maio, a onetime firebrand, now follows in Mr. Draghi’s footsteps and speaks about the importance of NATO, clearly seeing his future in the establishment.Mr. Conte instead has struggled to signal to his unsatisfied supporters that he can deliver on their interests. But he speaks in legalistic terms, is often inconsistent and has the added headache of constantly trying to appease the party’s often inscrutable founder, Beppe Grillo.Mr. Conte has made a habit of issuing ultimatums to the government. Usually he falls in line. But this time, he did not.“The scenario has changed, we need a different phase,” Mr. Conte told reporters after failing to reach a compromise during talks with Mr. Draghi on Wednesday. “We are ready to support the government but not to sign a blank bill. Whoever accuses us of irresponsibility needs to look in their own backyard.”Among Mr. Conte’s objections to the spending priorities, he has argued that the government has not set aside enough funds for a cost of living package. Five Star — which is traditionally close to Russia and admiring of its president, Vladimir V. Putin — has also opposed sending significant military support to Ukraine in response to the Russian invasion, something Mr. Draghi strongly supports.The potential departure of Mr. Draghi opens the door to forces who are much more sympathetic to Mr. Putin, and as a result risks fracturing Europe’s united front on issues such as sanctions and refusing Russian energy.Mr. Conte, reflecting Five Star’s environmentalist roots, has also vehemently opposed using government money to build a garbage incinerator to alleviate Rome’s devastating trash problems.Mr. Conte set off the spark that brought down the government, and even the parties that have been most solidly behind Mr. Draghi did not want to get caught in the conflagration.Enrico Letta, the leader of the center-left Democratic Party, which has drastically climbed in the polls as Five Star has plummeted, applied pressure on Five Star at a party meeting when he said he would be unwilling to form a new government without them. He added that early elections were preferable if the broad coalition fell apart.Mr. Conte’s former ally, Matteo Salvini of the nationalist League party, said he, too, might pull his support from the coalition government and push for early elections if Five Star left.“If a coalition party doesn’t back a government decree that’s it, enough is enough,” Mr. Salvini said on Italian television. “It seems clear that we should go to elections.”Even so, his support has declined, while backing has increased for the hard-right Brothers of Italy party, led by Giorgia Meloni. Her party would be the greatest beneficiary of early elections, which she supports.The earliest time for that election would be autumn, which would disturb the usual drafting of Italy’s budget and create the unlikely event of Italian politicians campaigning in the summer.Gaia Pianigiani More

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      The week where decades happened: how the west finally woke up to Putin

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      The week where decades happened: how the west finally woke up to Putin From Germany’s shock military spending rise to sanctions unity, leaders have come together over the war in Ukraine

      Russia-Ukraine war: live news
      Lenin, a Russian leader as obsessed with history as Vladimir Putin, famously said: “There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.” This has been the latter. The little more than a week since Russian troops invaded Ukraine has indeed shaken the world. Change has been telescoped, national taboos broken, moribund institutions given purpose and the spectre of a nuclear war in Europe has been raised for the first time since the 1980s. Germany has called it Zeitenwende, the turning point. It will not just be Ukraine that is changed for ever by this war.But there is something specific about how war accelerates change. In The Deluge, his classic work on how society is changed by war, the British historian Arthur Marwick wrote: “War acts as a supreme challenge to, and test of, a country’s social and political institutions. War results not only in the destruction of inefficient institutions (such as the Tsarist regime in Russia), but also in the transformation of less efficient mechanisms into more efficient ones”.The west has surprised itself with its ability to respond to the misery inflicted on the people of Ukraine. All kinds of unimaginable images emerge. The German Bundestag cheered an extra €100bn (£82.4bn) on defence spending, followed by 100,000 people on the streets in protest at Putin. Matteo Salvini, the great Italian defender of Putin, bringing white tulips to the Ukrainian embassy. Liz Truss, the UK foreign secretary, attending a meeting of the EU foreign affairs ministers meeting. The Hungarian leader, Viktor Orbán, sharply criticised by human-rights groups and others over the years for his hardline border policies, sitting on a school bench opening his arms to refugees.It was just a fortnight ago that the German foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, had appeared at the Munich security conference to caution the crisis was not the moment to try to execute an 180-degree turn on the decades-old German policy banning the sale of arms into conflict zones. Josep Borrell, the EU external affairs chief, batted away calls for Ukraine to join the EU, saying they already had an exceptional trade deal. He spoke about the “power of the EU’s language”, distancing himself from his own one-time claim that the EU must learn “the language of power”.The next day – Sunday – all the talk was of Emmanuel Macron’s diplomatic initiative, and the concessions the French president had extracted from Vladimir Putin. Even on Wednesday, on the eve of the invasion, Baerbock gave an interview saying it was impossible for Germany to impose the strongest sanctions because of “the massive collateral damage” to Germany’s own economy. Putin could end up laughing at us, she warned.Yet by the following weekend, two days after the invasion began on Thursday, Germany’s coalition government had started that 180-degree course correction. Chancellor Olaf Scholz and his cabinet agreed to send Ukraine 1,000 anti-tank weapons and 500 anti-aircraft Stinger missiles, lifting restrictions on German weapons being sent to conflict zones by third parties in the process. The next day, Scholz told the Bundestag in his trademark matter-of-fact manner that he was injecting €100bn into German defence, but protecting other budgets, and defence spending would rise above 2% of German GDP. The MPs from government and the CDU gasped and cheered in equal measure. David McAllister, a leading figure in the German CDU and chair of the European parliament’s foreign affairs select committee, admits he nearly fell off his chair when he heard the plans.Russian forces attacked multiple targets in southern UkraineThe promised growth catapults Germany into becoming the third largest spender on defence globally, behind only the US and China. GlobalData forecasts an annual German defence budget of $83.5bn in 2024, equating to a 45% increase on 2021’s budget of $57.5bn. That is bigger than France and the UK. Overnight Germany became not just an economic but also a geopolitical powerhouse. Polls said 78% of Germans backed the decision.Matthias Matthijs, Europe senior fellow for Europe at the Council on Foreign Relations, said: “It is quite astonishing how fast this government broke pretty well every taboo in postwar German foreign policy.”He attributes the scale of the change to a visit to Berlin on Sunday by the Polish prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki. “I came to Berlin to shake the conscience of Germany,” Morawiecki said.Sophia Besch, from the Centre for European Reform, points out Scholz himself insisted he had not acted due to pressure from allies, but due to Germany changing its view of the threat posed by Putin. “The truth is the world did not change last Thursday,” she said. “Berlin for years has ignored the warnings that came from many of our allies and from Putin. We need to learn the lessons of how this could have happened and how we could have been so blind. We are leaving behind some of our old beliefs – that economic interdependence prevents conflict, but I am not sure we know yet with what we are replacing this belief.”Sergey Lagodinsky, a German Green MEP, argued Germany needs not only to spend more money, but to shift its mindset without becoming militaristic or interventionist. It needs to discuss how to adopt escalation, including military escalation, as leverage as part of its foreign policy toolbox. Foreign policy is not just a peace policy, Friedenspolitik in German, but also the ability to deal, manage and face conflict.But the new German coalition, faced by the need to extricate itself from Russian energy, may have to challenge other orthodoxies. The Green economics minister, Robert Habeck, does not rule out extending the use of coal-fired power plants. “This blind, naive, one-sided relationship of dependency on Russia for energy for decades is one of the biggest strategic mistakes of the past 20 years,” Lagodinsky said. “Now we are stuck. It represents a medium- and long-term problem”.But Putin’s recklessness is not just causing a revolution in Germany, but across Europe.Sweden abandoned its policy of not sending weapons to conflict zones, agreeing to send Bofors AT-4, a single-use anti-tank launcher, to Ukraine, plus medical supplies. In Finland, a bombshell poll showed 53% want Finland to join Nato. “This poll flipped everything on its head,” said Charly Salonius-Pasternak, of the Finnish Institute of International Affairs. Moreover the poll showed that if voters were told that politicians said they backed the plan the support went up to two-thirds. “You could sense the president, Sauli Niinisto, realised the whole defence dynamic was changed.” Niinisto, seen as one of the best readers of what Putin is thinking is now rushing to hold urgent talks with Joe Biden in the White House.Ukraine war prompts European reappraisal of its energy supplies Read moreEven in Switzerland, leaders had to catch up with the public mood in the space of a weekend, and by the Monday an emergency cabinet promised to implement the entire EU sanctions package. The decision does not formally end a policy of neutrality that has survived two world wars, but there is now pressure to track down the many oligarchs that live in the country. There are also calls for an increase in the defence budgetThere has been a mini-revolution in Italy, too, where the prime minister, Mario Draghi, accused last week of seeking sanctions carve-outs to protect Italy’s dependence on Russian gas, has also found some mettle. He told parliament on Tuesday: “Yes, we want peace, but it is obvious that whoever amassed more than 60km of tanks near Kyiv does not want peace. We cannot turn our backs on Ukraine. Italy does not intend to look away.” He proposed an international public register of those with assets of more than €10m. In France, Macron looks likely to be re-elected comfortably next month as the rightwing candidates find themselves compromised by links to Putin they cannot deny.Eastern European countries, sometimes hostile to refugees, have instead had the most open arms. Poland has taken an unprecedented 600,000 people. Orbán the Hungarian leader photographed smiling at child refugees, vows “No one will be left uncared for.”The UK too has been experiencing unusually heavy traffic on the Road to Damascus. The Conservative government promises there will be no hiding place for oligarchs, publishing the delayed economic crime bill and seemingly unnerving Roman Abramovich into selling his stake in Chelsea football club. The endless denigration of Brussels has stopped. “The quality and intensity of the contacts between the EU and UK has been different to anything since before Brexit,” one EU official said. “We have restored a level of trust”.But it has been at the level of the European Union that the action has been quickest and most surprising, revealing Ursula von der Leyen, the head of the EU Commission and former German defence minister, as a powerful advocate for action. For the EU to release €500m from the European Peace Facility to provide equipment and supplies to the Ukrainian armed forces, including – for the first time – lethal equipment, was a first. EU military staff based in Poland are now coordinating military supplies into Ukraine. The EU as a military player is no longer just the stuff of seminars.Equally, the Commission in discussing its EU sanctions package acted with an unparalleled speed, and by consensus among the member states. Some EU sanctions packages take months to be agreed as one country or other exploiting the requirement for unanimity uses their veto power to pursue a national interest.That the UK, US and EU were able to coordinate an attack on the Russian central bank, freezing out some Russian banks from the global Swift bank payment system and implementing measures to prevent Russian banks and firms raising capital, showed a wholly unexpected level of resolve. This was a financial declaration of war – an attempt to turn Russia into a pariah economy – something never tried before, using methods never deployed before. It involved, for instance, some G20 central banks freezing the Russian central bank reserves held in their own jurisdiction, so depleting the war chest of reserves that Putin had accumulated to defend his economy if it came under western attack.All this is remarkable, indeed epoch-making, but not a cause for celebration. The institutions of liberal democracy may have belatedly shown resolve and unity, but in the here and now they are still losing. Keir Giles, from the Chatham House thinktank, is blunt: “Russia will want to present Zelenskiy with an appalling choice – whether to fight on at immense human cost and to the destruction of his country, infrastructure and economy or to submit to his terms in order that life can go on.“The decision to abandon Ukraine to that fate was made by the west when it gave the green light to Putin by reassuring him that no one would intervene. Nato does not have a strategy to win the war in Ukraine because Nato does not want to be in the war in Ukraine.”European politicians will also be worrying as the price of bread and energy soars in the months ahead whether voters are willing to make the sacrifice.the Lithuanian foreign minister told the UK foreign affairs select committee that half-measures would not do. “Putin has no boundaries to what instruments he is going to use and unleash against the Ukrainians”, Gabrielius Landsbergis, said, adding the west “had to go all-in”.He wants humanitarian corridors supported by no-fly zones. But the UK and the US have firmly rejected this since it would pit Nato pilots against Russian pilots. A Polish plan, backed by Borrell for Nato to provide Ukraine with Nato jets, training and bombs, got shot down in less than a day.The other remaining option is to end the final carve-outs in the sanctions regime. “The push is now for carpet sanctions to match the carpet bombing,” said Orysia Lutsevych from the Ukraine Forum, adding the UK, EU and the US are still buying more than €700m of oil, gas and other commodities that is the equivalent of 150 tanks a day that Russia can finance.That could be stopped either through an energy trade embargo, or by reversing the EU decision to let Gazprombank and Sberbank, the vehicles through which Europe pays for Russian oil and gas, stay in the Swift payment system. UK officials briefed on Wednesday they want to abolish the carve out given by the EU. If these two banks are thrown out of Swift that might immobilise Russian oil and gas exports, or lead to unspecified retaliation by Putin.The breadth and range of economic and financial measures taken against Moscow, not to mention growing sporting and cultural isolation, has been a humiliation for Putin, but it is also a risk for the west if the Russian leader sees no answer but total victory. “He is in a corner, but unfortunately with nuclear weapons, says Giles.The west has been transformed in a week, but the question this weekend is if it would be willing, forced by the chaos of events, to go even further. The charge facing the west after a week of war is the one made by George Orwell of Neville Chamberlain in 1938. Like almost everyone at the time, he “neither wanted to pay the price of peace nor that of war”.TopicsUkraineEuropeRussiaGermanyMilitaryArms tradeSwedenfeaturesReuse this content More

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      in Elections

      Italian Lawmakers Say They Have Agreed to Re-Elect Sergio Mattarella as President

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      Mr. Mattarella has presided over a chaotic seven years in which the country swung wildly from the left to the right, acting as the guardrails of Italy’s democracy.ROME — After noxious and chaotic back-room negotiations, Italian lawmakers said on Saturday that they had reached a consensus to keep the status quo in place and would ask the country’s current president, Sergio Mattarella, to serve another seven-year term.The Italian Parliament is expected to re-elect Mr. Mattarella later Saturday, in the sixth day of secret votes that have revealed the fractious politics and crumbling alliances just beneath the surface of Italy’s national unity government.In Italy’s unpredictable politics, nothing is certain until the ballots are officially counted, and Mr. Mattarella, at 80, has been reluctant to serve again. But a week of inconclusive voting had already revealed the inability of the different political interests within the governing coalition to rally around a new candidate.The apparent choice of Mr. Mattarella essentially amounted to a punt — to avoid early elections and to prolong Italy’s current period of stability under Prime Minister Mario Draghi, who himself had coveted the job.But in a private meeting on Saturday morning, Mr. Draghi personally asked Mr. Mattarella to consider staying on because the political chaos over the inconclusive ballots had begun to suck in institutional figures, like the president of the Senate and the head of the Secret Service, two prominent women who were proposed as candidates only to be roundly rejected and tarnished.Mr. Draghi returned from the meeting and then called the governing coalition’s party leaders to try to broker a deal, according to an official in Mr. Draghi’s office who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss it publicly.By leaving Mr. Draghi in place, the lawmakers hoped to avert the political chaos of early elections that his departure may have encouraged. The choice of Mr. Mattarella instead increased the likelihood that Mr. Draghi, a former president of the European Central Bank, would continue to lead the unity government.Having Mr. Draghi’s hand on day-to-day affairs was certain to calm international markets as well as the European Union’s leadership in Brussels, which is counting on Italy to effectively manage hundreds of billions of dollars in pandemic recovery funds and demonstrate the wisdom of the bloc’s experiment in collective debt.Mario Draghi, left, at the Quirinal Palace in Rome in February 2021.Francesco Ammendola/Presidential Palace, via ReutersMr. Draghi’s supporters would have preferred that he be elected president, hoping that his steadying influence, even in the often ceremonial role of the presidency, would provide Italy stability beyond the country’s next scheduled elections, in 2023.But for them, the re-election of Mr. Mattarella amounts to the second-best option because it freezes the current political situation in place and leaves open the possibility that Mr. Draghi could still someday ascend to the Quirinal Palace, the home of presidents and the past home of popes.While Mr. Draghi is expected to stay on as prime minister for the months ahead, speculation is rife that Mr. Mattarella would resign early from his second term as president and open the way for Italy’s next Parliament to elect Mr. Draghi at a less politically delicate time. The official in Mr. Draghi’s office said Mr. Draghi and Mr. Mattarella did not discuss anything of the sort on Saturday morning.Mr. Mattarella “understands that this is a critical time for Italy,” said Roberto D’Alimonte, an expert in the Italian political system at Luiss Guido Carli University in Rome. “And that the status quo needs to be kept.”But months can be an eternity in Italy’s volatile politics. Most experts agree that as the elections get closer, the political ambitions and gamesmanship of the opposing political parties in the government will make it increasingly hard for the government to act, to pass new legislation, or even to stay together.And there is no guarantee that Mr. Mattarella would resign, or if he did, that the new Parliament would be filled with electors partial to Mr. Draghi.Mr. Mattarella was first elected in 2015 when he was championed by the prime minister at the time, Matteo Renzi, and he enjoyed broad support across the political spectrum. Born in Palermo, Sicily, he is the younger brother of Piersanti Mattarella, whom the mafia assassinated in 1980 during his term as Sicily’s governor.Sergio Mattarella, a reserved lawyer who taught parliamentary law in Palermo, was elected to Parliament in 1983 as a member of the Christian Democratic Party, which dominated postwar Italy until it imploded after a series of bribery scandals in the early 1990s. He served in Parliament until 2008, holding a number of high-level government posts under the Christian Democrats and in later center-left governments. In 2011, he was elected by Parliament to Italy’s Constitutional Court.As president, the grandfatherly Mr. Mattarella, with his snow-white hair and quiet style, has demonstrated moral authority in his ceremonial role.But he has also presided with a firm hand over a chaotic seven years in which the country swung wildly from the left to the right and elected among the most populist and anti-European Parliaments in Europe before transforming once again into an establishment bedrock under Mr. Draghi, whom Mr. Mattarella personally brought in to end a government crisis last year.After populists scored large victories in the 2018 elections, Mr. Mattarella prevented from taking power a government that he considered in violation of the Italian Constitution for its anti-European character, resulting in leaders of the anti-establishment Five Star Movement calling for his impeachment. It is a mark of how much Italian politics has moderated around Mr. Draghi that those same leaders today urged their followers to vote for Mr. Mattarella. But many of them had a strong personal interest in stability, as early elections were likely to cost many of them their jobs and pensions.Counting votes on Saturday at Parliament in Rome.Pool photo by Roberto MonaldoMr. Mattarella repeatedly made it clear that he did not want to stay in the job and had moved his things to a new apartment in Rome. Memes swapped among Italian politicians and reporters this week showed Mr. Mattarella answering the phone and pretending he was not home, or tying sheets together to sneak out of a window of the presidential palace. After news of his selection became public, Italian commentators jokingly expressed solidarity with his plight of having to pack and unpack boxes.But over a week of disastrous negotiations that highlighted the lack of cohesion across the political spectrum, but especially in the country’s center right, which came into the election hoping to flex its muscles but left weak and splintered, he emerged as the only name anyone could agree on.Matteo Salvini, the leader of the nationalist League party who had hoped the election would act as a show of force for the center right and his role as its de facto leader, exited the week much weaker and politically bloodied. All of his proposed candidates, and there were many, failed to gain traction.“We’ll ask Mattarella to stay,” he said Saturday. “And like this, the team stays as it is. Draghi remains at Palazzo Chigi” in his office of prime minister.Silvio Berlusconi, who had himself hoped to become president before withdrawing his candidacy shortly before voting began, had put a veto on Mr. Draghi becoming president because it could endanger the government. Mr. Berlusconi had a “long and cordial” phone call with Mr. Mattarella “ensuring him our fullest support,” according to Antonio Tajani, a leader of Mr. Berlusconi’s political party, Forza Italia. Mr. Tajani said he was very satisfied with the choice of Mr. Mattarella.The centrist Italia Viva party, led by Mr. Renzi, applauded the choice of Mr. Mattarella. “We voted for him then and today we vote for him again enthusiastically,” the group said on Twitter.If Mr. Mattarella is the winner of the week’s voting, and Mr. Draghi remains a player and a potential president for Italy, the election had its fair share of casualties, too. While the Democratic Party got its chosen candidate, the center right emerged seeming battered and inept. Some of its biggest power players talked about resigning. The contempt and diverging interests among the nominal allies spilled into view.Mr. Mattarella on Saturday outside the Quirinal Palace.Massimo Percossi/EPA, via Shutterstock For days, the competing political parties engaged in all sorts of tactics to pursue their narrow interests, gain the upper hand or defend against partisan candidates. They cast blank ballots and floated symbolic candidates used to measure the compactness of their voting blocs. They timed their own voters to make sure they were not writing down names on blank ballots. They publicly offered what they called ideal, real, credible candidates, but in reality, they meant to burn those candidacies by merely articulating the syllables of their names.On Thursday, the threshold for victory went down to 505 votes, an absolute majority, and tensions increased. On Friday, the number of votes increased to two a day, and Mr. Salvini, tried to force a candidacy of a political ally, Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati, the president of the Senate, despite threats from liberals and his nominal partners in the national unity coalition that it would prompt the collapse of the government.Her candidacy came up far short and did not even succeed in winning all of the votes of the center-right bloc. Momentum began to move toward Mr. Mattarella, but on Friday night, desperate politicians, including the embittered former prime minister Giuseppe Conte, whom Mr. Mattarella had replaced with Mr. Draghi, expressed backing for a generic female candidate. The move was roundly interpreted as a last-ditch power tactic and merely claimed new political casualties. But on Saturday, all of those gambits seemed to end and the members of the national unity government decided to keep things exactly how they were, with Mr. Mattarella as president and Mr. Draghi as prime minister. But everything also seemed different. The election had taken a toll.The election, Enrico Letta, the leader of the Democratic Party, told reporters on Saturday, showed “a political system that is blocked.” He added, “This isn’t working.”Elisabetta Povoledo More

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      in World Politics

      Italy’s Presidential Race Puts a Strain on Political Balance

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      Italy’s parliament gathered in a joint session of both houses on January 24 to elect the country’s next president who will succeed Sergio Mattarella, whose term will end on February 3.

      A total of 1,009 voters, including 58 delegates chosen by regional councils and known as “great electors,” took part in the first stage of voting, which will be repeated every day until a consensus is reached. A clear vote is unlikely to be reached before Thursday as cross-party negotiations are still underway and the majority of lawmakers have decided to cast a blank vote as a delaying action amid intense backroom talks.

      From the Maghreb to the East, Poking the EU Has an MO

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      Usually a symbolic formality, Italy’s presidential election is this time a focus of special attention by media and citizens, as the country’s fragile national unity and political balance depend on its outcome. The vote comes at a pivotal time, as the country has recently agreed to an EU-sponsored €191.5 billion ($213 billion) program of economic and social reforms aimed at rebooting its national economy.

      Among the top contenders is Prime Minister Mario Draghi, a former president of the European Central Bank, who has openly signaled his willingness to run for the job. For Draghi, a seven-year presidential term is undoubtedly more appealing than ending his mandate with a disorderly, mixed coalition ahead of general elections next year.

      Embed from Getty Images

      But parties are reluctant to vote for Draghi as his eventual election as president and resignation as prime minister could lead to snap general elections. His exit as head of government, a role he was appointed to by Mattarella in February 2021 after the collapse of the so-called Conte II cabinet, in favor of the presidency could bring Italy back to a new phase of instability and political uncertainty. 

      Why Does This Election Matter?

      In recent decades, Italy’s national politics has undergone profound transformation concerning the structure and ideologies of both parties, and the role of the president has become increasingly important. Beyond exercising moral authority, representing national unity and being the guarantor of the independence and integrity of the nation, as defined by the Italian Constitution, the head of state takes charge during a political crisis.

      The president has the authority to select the new prime minister, as Mattarella did last year in choosing Draghi to lead the country out of a political impasse after the resignation of technocratic Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte. The president also has the authority to approve or deny the appointment of ministers who will form the new cabinet, and they can refuse mandates to weak coalitions and dissolve parliament, setting the country on the path to national elections.

      Will the Government Fall Apart?

      The situation is particularly delicate as it involves the stability and longevity of the current government and the possibility of early general elections. The outcome of the presidential vote may lead to different scenarios, potentially able to shift allegiances, disrupt existing coalitions and alter the balance of power among Italy’s political parties.

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      If parliament fails to agree on a candidate, the vote will undoubtedly become a source of division between the left and the right, inevitably opening the path to a political rupture. 

      The government’s collapse would not only damage Italy’s political equilibrium, but also impact the European Union. Brussels has heavily bet on Italy’s ability to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic — which rocked the economy and markets — endorsing prime minister Draghi’s national recovery and resilience plan.

      What About Mario Draghi?

      The presidential election is also important because it could represent a turning point in determining the political future of Prime Minister Draghi, who has provided a period of balance and good governance in Italian politics.

      According to his supporters, choosing Draghi as the next president and having him in office for the next seven years would increase the chances to keep markets stable, which would imply the prospect of long-term economic recovery and, at the same time, give Italy more credibility at a European and international level.

      Yet, many lawmakers are pushing for President Mattarella to stay on for another year, arguing that this would be the best solution to guarantee the government’s stability until scheduled general elections in 2023.

      Who Are the Other Contenders? 

      As the prominent businessman and former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi withdrew his candidacy, saying that Italy could not afford further political division, far-right leaders Matteo Salvini (Northern League) and Giorgia Meloni (Brothers of Italy) are considering a list of moderate right-wing figures. This includes former Senator Marcello Pera and ex-mayor of Milan Letizia Moratti as potential candidates, hoping to gain support from the center left.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Other possible contenders include Pier Ferdinando Casini, a long-serving centrist senator and former speaker of the lower house who reportedly has good cross-party relations, Marta Cartabia, a judge and former president of the Italian constitutional court currently serving as minister of justice, and Giuliano Amato, a former politician who served twice as prime minister and thrice as minister during the 1990s.

      After the first three ballots, where a two-thirds majority is required (673 out of 1,009 voters), an absolute majority of 505 votes is enough for a candidate to be elected. Yet if the voting process continues past the end of Mattarella’s term, it would be clear that the presidential election has paved the way for another unpredictable political earthquake.

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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      in Elections

      Rome Mayor Loses Re-election Bid, a Defeat for Five Star Movement

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      In five years in office, Virginia Raggi failed to stem the dysfunction of Italy’s capital, where voters will choose between two of her rivals in a runoff.ROME — Voters on Monday resoundingly rejected the re-election bid of Rome’s mayor, Virginia Raggi of the Five Star Movement, who swept into power five years ago promising change but was unable to turn around the degradation of services and quality of life that has become a hallmark of the capital.Instead, Ms. Raggi, the first woman to govern Rome and its youngest mayor, became associated with the city’s decline, earning her — and her party — a national reputation for incompetence.Speaking to supporters at a hotel in downtown Rome late on Monday, Ms. Raggi appeared to concede defeat.“As they say in Rome, I took on the most difficult part of the job and I did it with conviction,” she said. “Now those who come after me have no more excuses for not doing a good job, and we’re going to be watching them closely.”She lagged well behind the two leading candidates: Enrico Michetti, a lawyer supported by several parties on the right, and Roberto Gualtieri, a former finance minister and the candidate of a center-left coalition led by the Democratic Party.With most election districts counted, Mr. Michetti had more than 30 percent of the vote, Mr. Gualtieri 27 percent and Ms. Raggi just under 20 percent. Carlo Calenda, a rival to Mr. Gualtieri to be the center-left standard-bearer, had about 19 percent.With no candidate winning more than half the vote, Mr. Michetti and Mr. Gualtieri will compete in a runoff election on Oct. 18. Ms. Raggi told her supporters that she would not openly back either man.“The vote is free,” she said. “Votes are not packages to move around, nor are citizens cattle to be taken to pasture.”Ms. Raggi was once a bright spot in the firmament of Five Star, an upstart anti-establishment party that had charmed Italians who were jaded with the country’s political class.But the city’s problems piled up on her watch, as did uncollected garbage, attracting swarms of sea gulls, crows, and even hungry boars. A pothole epidemic saw no fix in sight. Public buses caught on fire, and some cyclists complained that the bike lanes the mayor had installed were unsafe and poorly maintained.Then on Saturday night, just hours before polls opened, a 19th century bridge in a trendy Rome neighborhood caught fire. Investigators and experts are still looking into the causes of the fire, but the metaphor of Rome burning was not lost on Ms. Raggi’s critics.Municipal elections were held on Monday in over 1,000 Italian cities and towns, but it is not yet clear what they mean for national politics. The next parliamentary elections could be more than a year and a half away.Prime Minister Mario Draghi, an independent and the former president of the European Central Bank, has broad support in Parliament, but low voter turnout may be a reflection of general disaffection among the electorate. Only 48.8 percent of Rome’s electors went to the polls, about ten percent less than five years ago, and the national average fell just short of 55 percent, the lowest ever.Ms. Raggi’s fate was, in part, a reflection of her party’s. Five Star has hemorrhaged support since triumphant national elections in 2018, when it won the largest share of the vote and formed part of the governing coalition.“It’s one thing to promise changes when you’re in the opposition, another to transform them into effective policies when you’re in the government,” said Roberto Biorcio, a professor of political sociology at the University of Milan at Bicocca. “In this sense, she followed this downward trajectory.”In Rome, disillusionment with Ms. Raggi grew as she failed to build a strong team, frequently replacing top cabinet members, which paralyzed administrative decisions.“It was the continuation of a trend of the deterioration of the city,” said Giovanni Orsina, the dean of Luiss University’s School of Government.“Rome’s problems are all still there,” after five years of Five Star government, he said, citing the garbage crisis and the city’s notoriously ineffective transport system. “And now the bridge caught fire ahead of the elections.”Support for the Five Star Movement also eroded in other cities. In Turin, another big win for the party in 2016, its mayoral candidate finished a distant third.But center-leftists where the Five Star and Democratic Party were allied won their races outright in closely watched races in Bologna and Naples, giving a boost to former Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, who was elected president of the Five Star in August. He has been pushing for these alliances, putting him on a collision course with more orthodox Five Star members who remain grounded in their anti-establishment roots.The outcome in various cities “suggests that where the Five Star and Democrats joined forces they can obtain some good results,” Mr. Biorcio said.Ms. Raggi may have lost her job, but she still has clout within Five Star, after being elected last month to the party’s governing body. And at 43, she is still young.“After being mayor of Rome for five years, it will be hard for her to go back to being a lawyer,” said Professor Orsina. “Now she’ll try to see if she’s able to parlay a different political future in the Five Star Movement.” More

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      in Elections

      Behind One New York Times Pulitzer: Hundreds of Journalists

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      When The New York Times was honored with the prestigious prize in the category of public service for its coverage of the coronavirus pandemic, it reflected the contributions of the entire newsroom.Times Insider explains who we are and what we do, and delivers behind-the-scenes insights into how our journalism comes together.This month, from a steep red staircase overlooking The New York Times’s newsroom, Dean Baquet, the executive editor, announced that the staff had won the Pulitzer Prize for public service for its coverage of the coronavirus.The Times, which has received 132 Pulitzers since they were first awarded in 1917, has won in the public service category, regarded as the most prestigious of the prizes, six times. Wesley Morris, a Times critic at large, also received a Pulitzer, his second, for criticism for his writing on the intersection of race and culture in America.The Pulitzer board recognized several facets of the coronavirus coverage. The Times reported early on the outbreak in China in January 2020. Tracked cases across the nation and the world through an intensive data project. Relayed developments 24 hours a day. Reported on the race to understand the virus and the failure of governments to respond. Documented racial and social inequities of the pandemic. Provided vivid accounts of suffering worldwide. And observed the monumental death toll.That coverage encompassed not just articles but graphics, video, data journalism, design, photography and podcasting. The effort drew upon the full resources of the newsroom, with many staff members putting themselves at personal risk and others taking on new roles to meet the demands of the coverage or provide support. And all of it was executed with nearly all employees working remotely and as The Times also covered the nation’s racial unrest, the impact of climate change and a tumultuous presidential campaign and election.Speaking to employees, many of whom were watching the livestreamed awards ceremony at home, Mr. Baquet, along with other newsroom leaders, reflected on what it meant to be honored at this time.“I just want to pause for a moment on the full power of these prizes and what they say about what you accomplished in a year when many of you suffered from your own loss and disruption,” he said. “Literally, hundreds of people had a hand in this coverage.”A key component of the coverage was a tracking project that compiled virus data on a variety of measures. The Times released the data, which has been used by medical researchers and government officials.More than 100 people from across the newsroom, as well as 50 freelancers and students, have worked on the tracking effort. Reporters and researchers filed more than 700 public records requests for data on populations like nursing homes and prisons. Engineers created a database to manage hundreds of data sources.The team has now published more than 3,000 daily tracking pages, covering subjects that include country, state and county trends, reopenings and vaccinations.“It was easily the largest and probably the most ambitious data project our newsroom has ever taken on,” Archie Tse, the graphics director, said.At the same time, the National desk helped reveal the disproportionate toll that the virus took on people of color. And when the overall U.S. death toll reached 100,000 people, a team of journalists marked the staggering figure with a front page consisting of victims’ names and biographical details.“We strove every day not to be so focused on the numbers that we forgot the people behind them,” said Marc Lacey, an assistant managing editor and the former National editor.On the Health and Science desk, journalists followed the efforts to explain how the virus spread, its effect on the body and the development of a vaccine. Members of the desk edited more than 1,100 online articles on the virus and assisted other journalists in the newsroom on hundreds more.“We covered Ebola and Zika, but none of us had ever experienced such a ravenous hunger for science news,” said Celia Dugger, the Health and Science editor.Some of the earliest work began with the International desk, which reported from the front lines in Wuhan, China, where the outbreak first emerged, then charted the failures in Italy and later examined the impact of the virus all over the world.The desk also was instrumental in the live briefing on the virus, a constantly updated news feed that would go on to involve multiple departments in the newsroom and that remains a staple of the coverage, more than 500 days later. Chris Buckley, a Times correspondent previously based in China, was on a train on his way to cover the lockdown in Wuhan in January 2020 when his editor called him and asked him to start writing for the live briefing. At the time, Mr. Buckley was skeptical: “Live briefing? About this story? From a train? So, that call was one of those reminders that sometimes our editors are actually right,” he said, joking.“Since then our coverage of Covid has never stopped.”Many of the leaders and staff members who played critical roles in the two Pulitzer Prizes this year gathered for the ceremony.Damon Winter/The New York Times More

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      in US Politics

      A global agreement on taxing corporations is in sight – let’s make sure it happens

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      For more than four years, France, Germany, Italy and Spain have been working together to create an international tax system fit for the 21st century. It is a saga of many twists and turns. Now it’s time to come to an agreement. Introducing this fairer and more efficient international tax system was already a priority before the current economic crisis, and it will be all the more necessary coming out of it.Why? First, because the crisis was a boon to big tech companies, which raked in profit at levels not seen in any other sector of the economy. So how is it that the most profitable companies do not pay a fair share of tax? Just because their business is online doesn’t mean they should not pay taxes in the countries where they operate and from which their profits derive. Physical presence has been the historical basis of our taxation system. This basis has to evolve with our economies gradually shifting online. Like any other company, they should pay their fair share to fund the public good, at a level commensurate with their success.Second, because the crisis has exacerbated inequalities. It is urgent to put in place an international tax system that is efficient and fair. Currently, multinationals are able to avoid corporate taxes by shifting profits offshore. That’s not something the public will continue to accept. Fiscal dumping cannot be an option for Europe, nor can it be for the rest of the world. It would only lead to a further decline in corporate income tax revenues, wider inequalities and an inability to fund vital public services.Third, because we need to re-establish an international consensus on major global issues. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, with the support of our countries, has been doing exceptional work in the area of international taxation for many years. The OECD has put forward fair and balanced proposals on both subjects: the taxation of the profit of the most profitable multinationals, notably digital giants (Pillar 1), and the minimal taxation (Pillar 2). We can build on this work. For the first time in decades, we have an opportunity to reach a historic agreement on a new international tax system that would involve every country in the world. Such a multilateral agreement would signal a commitment to working together on major global issues.With the new Biden administration, there is no longer the threat of a veto hanging over this new system. The new US proposal on minimal taxation is an important step in the direction of the proposal initially floated by our countries and taken over by the OECD. The commitment to a minimum effective tax rate of at least 15% is a promising start. We therefore commit to defining a common position on a new international tax system at the G7 finance ministers meeting in London today. We are confident it will create the momentum needed to reach a global agreement at the G20 in Venice in July. It is within our reach. Let’s make sure it happens. We owe it to our citizens.
      Nadia Calviño, second deputy prime minister of Spain, is the country’s economy minister. Daniele Franco is minister of economy and finance in Italy. Bruno Le Maire is France’s minister of economy, finance and recovery. Olaf Scholz is German vice-chancellor and minister of finance More

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      in US Politics

      US sets – and quickly suspends – tariffs on UK and others over digital taxes

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      The Biden administration announced 25% tariffs on over $2bn worth of imports from the UK and five other countries on Wednesday over their taxes on US technology companies, but immediately suspended the duties to allow time for negotiations to continue.The US trade representative, Katherine Tai, said the threatened tariffs on goods from Britain, Italy, Spain, Turkey, India and Austria had been agreed after an investigation concluded that their digital taxes discriminated against US companies.The move underscores the US threat of retaliation, first made under the Trump administration, over digital-services taxes on US-based companies including Alphabet, Apple and Facebook, that has sparked an international row over which countries should have taxing rights over some of the world’s largest companies.The US trade representative’s (USTR) office published lists of imports that would face tariffs if international tax negotiations fail to reach a solution. Goods from Britain worth $887m, including clothing, overcoats, footwear and cosmetics, would face a 25% charge as would about $386m worth of goods from Italy, including clothing, handbags and optical lenses. USTR said it would impose tariffs on goods worth $323m from Spain, $310m from Turkey, $118m from India and $65m from Austria.The potential tariffs, based on 2019 import data, aim to equal the amount of digital taxes that would be collected from US firms, a USTR official said. The news came as finance leaders from G7 countries prepare to meet in London on Friday and Saturday to discuss the state of tax negotiations, including taxation of large technology companies and a US proposal for a global minimum corporate tax. US tariffs threatened against France over its digital tax were suspended in January to allow time for negotiations.Tai said she was focused on “finding a multilateral solution” to digital taxes and other international tax issues.“Today’s actions provide time for those negotiations to continue to make progress while maintaining the option of imposing tariffs under Section 301 if warranted in the future,” Tai said.Tai faced a Wednesday deadline to announce the tariff action, or the statutory authority of the trade investigations would have lapsed.A British government spokesperson said the UK tax was aimed at ensuring tech firms pay their fair share of tax and was temporary. “Our digital services tax is reasonable, proportionate and non-discriminatory,” the spokesperson said. “It’s also temporary and we’re working positively with international partners to find a global solution to this problem.”Reuters contributed to this article More