Crosetto and the M5s and Avs forfeit at the Nato lunch: "Disrespectful and uncivilized: it was a moment of collective responsibility"

Those who are absent are always wrong. Defense Minister Guido Crosetto makes this clear in this interview, commenting on the news revealed by Il Foglio of the forfeit of the parliamentarians of the M5s and Avs at tomorrow's lunch at Palazzo Baracchini with the parliamentarians of the NATO assembly. It is an informal meeting with deputies and senators of the majority and opposition on the eve of the Atlantic Alliance summit in The Hague, while the world seems to be burning. Here, Minister Crosetto, how did you take these refusals: legitimate political strategy, a snapshot of a center-left in a tailspin on NATO or is there something else? "Those who chose not to participate did so in an uncivilized manner, showing a lack of respect towards the institutions, not towards the government".

How did this lunch tomorrow come about?

“In a democratic country with a mature democracy, a relationship between institutions is fundamental. For this reason I immediately accepted the request of the group president Lorenzo Cesa to meet the representatives of the Italian Parliament at the NATO Assembly”.

Is it a missed opportunity for those who won't be there or is it a strategy of the absentees to demonstrate to their respective fans, on the eve of Saturday's demonstration against rearmament, that in this phase we must be tough and pure?

“I don’t know that, I told them what I think about those who refused the invitation. I can add how this initiative was born”. How? “Simple: it was born to encourage a high dialogue, to transfer them useful information for their work. Because a dialogue in which you transfer everything you know without having to be in front of screens, televisions, to be able to discuss, compare, explain is useful”.

Something doesn't add up between his intentions and the response of some of the members of the parliamentary body, however. Crosetto responds after a long breath:

“Look, for me these are fundamental discussions, to make people understand what we are talking about, when we talk about external threats but also to understand their concerns”. Do you think there is a specific political party that is underestimating the international scenarios that are in motion at the moment?

“The goal of communications and discussions is simple and very linear: to make us all responsible. And it is, for me, to make people understand what Italy's tasks are in NATO, regardless of the color of the governments”. So what are these tasks? “For example, what is the commitment with respect to increasing military spending but above all with respect to the duty to provide target capability, that is, our part of collective defense. My commitment was and remains to illustrate and discuss without demagogy. Not only that”.

Not only what?

“Also explaining and reminding people about external threats, including the Russian one, the dangers that may arise.”

Perhaps for this reason the “no thanks” from Senator Maria Castellone and Deputy Luciano Cantone of the M5S, plus that of Senator Peppe De Cristofaro of Avs, did not go down well with the Minister of Defense who must have digested them as an institutional affront, rather than a political move. The PD will be there, led by Simona Malpezzi, representative of the most reformist wing of Elly Schlein's party, and with her two other parliamentarians. As will Matteo Richetti of Azione. The League also called the president of the Cesa group to confirm their presence. On the contrary, they say that in the M5S someone willing to go to the meeting would have been there, but no one felt like taking a possible reprimand from Giuseppe Conte, especially on the eve of a demonstration that, as the PD admitted yesterday, “risks having an anti-NATO platform”.

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