Schlein against Descalzi for praise of Egypt: “Did we sacrifice the truth about Regeni in exchange for their gas?”

“I think Italy cannot consider Egypt’s non-cooperation on the murder of Giulio Regeni as a price to pay on the altar of economic interests”. The secretary of the Democratic Party Elly Schlein from Treviso reports to the CEO of Eni, Claudio Descalziwho said yesterday from the stage of the Forza Italia convention in Milan: “Egypt helped us by giving up its loads this summer to send them to Italy to fill the stocks. These are countries that you get if you give”.

Today the dem secretary asks “if among the things to give in order to receive the impunity of the torturers and murderers of Giulio Regeni is also considered, an Italian, European researcher, for whom we still wear the bracelet on his wrist after years to ask for the truth justice. Or the deliverance of Patrick Zaki – he commented on the sidelines of an electoral meeting in Treviso – I think that Italy cannot consider the truth and justice regarding the murder and torture of Giulio Regeni and Egypt’s lack of cooperation, a price to pay on the altar of interests cheap”.

Yesterday Descalzi, speaking at the Forza Italia convention, explained that the speed with which Italy has managed to make up for the cut in Russian gas supplies is linked to the “deep roots” that our country and Eni have built in countries such as Egypt, Angola, Algeria, Congo, Mozambique. “Investing in time, respecting others, taking risks with those in need, thus becoming credible, is what has given us the capacity for this diversification, for this partial replacement, which will be complete in two years, of Russian gas”. Descalzi said. “It is the concept of freedom: if you respect, you free yourself but you also free your interlocutor”.

“If you don’t make investments and if you don’t take risks, if you don’t make exploration, development, investments that involve a risk because time passes and everything can change, even the market, these countries have no gas to sell you,” he said. explained the CEO of Eni underlining how it is a “very expensive” and “risky” activity: “in our case it is said to be at mining risk because you can find nothing, in 70% of mineral wells you can find nothing”. We therefore need “deep roots in these countries” and Eni was able to quickly make up for the shortage of Russian gas because “we have continued to invest in these countries, giving about 80% of the gas for local development, for access to energy, for electricity, to make development and growth, taking risks with them, because it is easier to take gas and export it”, Descalzi said again. This is “also the secret why we remained in Libya during the war”, where “we produce gas that 70% goes to the local market” unlike other companies that export oil. “We took risks for them, and when Europe and Italy needed we were able to talk to these countries to increase exports to Italy” even “with a very fast lead time” .

“Descalzi’s sentences at the Forza Italia convention are truly unacceptable. He thanks Egypt by saying: ‘To these countries, if you give, you receive’. The Egyptian government gave us Giulio Regeni’s corpse because he was murdered – was the immediate reaction of the co – spokesperson for Green Europe and deputy for Verdi and the Left Angelo Bonelli – What did Italy give Egypt in exchange for gas? Give up on prosecuting Regeni’s killers? Then the little lesson on freedom from the CEO of Eni is really unpleasant: ‘if you respect it, you free yourself but you also free your interlocutor’ But we freed Egypt from what? A country that violates human rights, whose government jails its critics and murderers? Pecunia non olet, to have gas”, concluded Bonelli.