From the mayor of a small Italian fishing village to the international symbol of tolerance: Domenico „Mimmo“ Lucano had picked up hundreds of migrants in his depopulated village and integrated them into the local economy. In the meantime he is suspended. As the news agency Ansa reports, he is now also the process made. Lucano and more than two dozen other people would therefore have to answer to the court on 11 June.
Already in early October he had been temporarily arrested for promoting illegal immigration. Lucano was released from house arrest, but he had to turn his back on the place in Calabria. The process must now clarify whether behind the model Riace really hide a criminal system, reported the newspaper „La Repubblica“.
Lucano had recently stated that he would not shy away from trial. „I defend myself in processes, not processes.“ The case had caused indignation at home and abroad. Against the project of the right-wing populist Interior Minister Matteo Salvini, relocate migrants from the village, even in Dresden people had taken to the streets. Last year, Lucano received the Dresden Peace Prize there for his refugee engagement, which is endowed with 10,000 euros (read here more about the mayor).
In Italy, since June, a coalition of right-wing populist Lega and five-star protest movement, which drives a hard anti-migration course.
