Ex Br, the French Supreme Court confirms the refusal of extradition

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The French Cassation confirmed France’s refusal to extradite the 10 ex Br of the years of lead to Italy.

The refusal to accept the appeal to the Court of Cassation on the extradition of 10 former militants of the extreme left Italians, mostly former members of the Red Brigades, refugees in France after the “years of lead”, was expected. For the 10, including 8 men including Giorgio Pietrostefani, convicted of the Calabresi murder, and 2 women (former Br Marina Petrella and Roberta Cappelli), the French court had already denied, on 29 June last year, the extradition requested by Italy. The president of the Chambre de l’instruction had motivated the refusal with respect for private and family life and with the right to a fair trial, guarantees provided for in articles 8 and 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights. However, the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, had stated the following day that “those people involved in blood crimes deserve to be judged in Italy”.

Consequently, the attorney general of the Paris Court of Appeal, Rémy Heitz, representing the government, had immediately filed an appeal with the Court of Cassation, deeming it necessary to ascertain whether the former terrorists convicted in Italy in absentia will benefit or not from a new process if France will deliver them. The prosecutor himself challenged the court’s decision on the alleged violation of the defendants’ private and family life.

Victim of the Red Brigades: Nordio intervenes against the Paris decision

“It is a shame that has no legal basis. My association and I appeal to Minister Nordio for the Italian justice to intervene. And I ask France: if the same thing had happened in reverse with the victims of the Bataclan?» Thus Roberto Della Rocca, one of the survivors of the attacks by the Red Brigades, comments on the sentence of the French Cassation. Della Rocca, who is also president of the National Association of Victims of Terrorism, worked for Fincantieri in 1980 when he was wounded in Genoa during an attack by the BR.