In the recent times there have been mass terror attacks in
different regions of the world, but in the case of Italy it has been different.
Many have wondered the reasons, others thought maybe it’s because they have the
best security forces and systems. Here is a live event that is pointed towards
terrorism in the country and how it was managed.
Each time Youssef Zaghba landed in
Bologna, there was someone waiting for him as he got off the plane. It was no
secret in Italy that the 22-year-old Moroccan-born Italian, identified as one
of three terrorists behind the London
Bridge attack, was under close surveillance.
“They would talk to him at the airport. Then, during his
stay, police officers would come a couple of times a day to check on him,” his
mother, Valeria Collina, said in an interview with the Guardian. “They were
friendly to Youssef. They would say: ‘Hey son, tell me what you have been
doing. What are you doing? How are you?’”
In the weeks since the attack, Zaghba’s role has shone a
light on the differences between how terror suspects are handled in Italy and the UK. Upon
his arrival in London, Zaghba’s mother said, he was never once stopped at the
airport or interrogated, even though Italian officials had warned British
counterparts that he was a threat.
Franco Gabrielli, Italy’s chief of police, has said of
Italy’s efforts to alert the UK: “Our conscience is clear.” Scotland Yard, in
turn, has said Zaghba “was not a police or MI5 subject of interest”.
Italy has suffered from its share of political violence in
recent decades, including the murder of two prominent anti-mafia judges in the
1990s. But unlike almost all of its big European neighbours, it has not
witnessed a major terrorist attack since the 1980s.
Is Italy just lucky? Have the country’s counter-terrorism
policies – born out of years of anti-mafia policing and intelligence work and a
decade of bloody political violence in the 1970s – given Italian officials an
edge in the age of Isis? Or are there other factors at play?
“The main difference is Italy doesn’t have a big population
of second-generation immigrants that have been radicalised or could potentially
be radicalised,” said Francesca Galli, an assistant professor at Maastricht
University and an expert in counter-terrorism policies.
It took about 20 people to watch a terror suspect full-time,
Galli said. Naturally, the abundance of resources required to closely monitor
anyone becomes more challenging if there are more suspects to watch.
Two recent incidents – the case of Zaghba, and another,
non-fatal terror incident in Milan in which a soldier and police officer were
stabbed by an Italian whose father was north African – point to a potential
shift in the threat profile in Italy. But Galli said that generally speaking
Italian police and counter-terrorism forces did not have to deal with a huge
number of people who were potentially at risk of radicalisation, unlike France,
Belgium and the UK.
That is not to say that Italy has escaped terrorist
activity. Anis Amri, the Tunisian who attacked a Berlin Christmas market last
year and was
shot by police in the outskirts of Milan, was believed to have been
radicalised in a prison in Sicily. Mohamed
Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, the Tunisian behind the deadly attack in Nice last year,
was identified by Italian police as having spent time in the border town of
Ventimiglia.
Some experts say Italy has been able to combat the threat of
Isis domestically by mastering legal and policing tools developed through years
of experience in mafia investigations, which in turn were born out of the
so-called “years of lead” – the period between the late 1960s and early 1980s
marked by acts of political terrorism by left- and rightwing militants.
According to figures released by the Italian interior
ministry, counter-terrorism authorities stopped and questioned 160,593 people
between March 2016 to March 2017. They stopped and interrogated about 34,000 at
airports and arrested about 550 suspected terrorists, and 38 have been
sentenced on terrorism charges. More than 500 websites have been shut down and
nearly half a million have been monitored.
Giampiero Massolo, who served as the director of Italian
intelligence from 2012 to 2016, said there was not a particular “Italian way”
to combat terrorism.
“We learned a very harsh
lesson during our terrorism years,” he said. “From that we drew the experience
of how important it is to maintain a constant dialogue at the operating level
between intelligence and law enforcement forces. In fact, prevention is key to
try to be effective in counter-terrorism.”
He added: “Another feature is to have a good control of the
territory. From this point of view, the absence of [French] banlieues-like
spots in Italian major cities, and …[the predominance] of small and medium
towns makes it easier to monitor the situation.”
There are also more specific practices. Arturo Varvelli, a
senior research fellow and terrorism expert at the thinktank Ispi, said the
lack of second- and third-generation Italians who might be susceptible to Isis
propaganda meant authorities instead focused on non-citizens, who could be
deported at the first signs of concern. Since January, 135 individuals had been
expelled, he said.
Italian authorities also rely on intercepted phone calls,
which unlike the UK can be used in evidence in court and – in cases related to
mafia and terrorism – can be obtained on the basis of suspicious activity and
not solid evidence.
Much like the fight against Italian organised crime – the
Camorra around Naples, the Cosa Nostra in Sicily, and the ’Ndrà ngheta in the
south – infiltrating and disrupting terror networks requires breaking close
social and even family relationships.
People suspected of being jihadis are encouraged to break
ranks and cooperate with Italian authorities, who use residency permits and
other incentives, Galli said. There has been a recognition, too, of the dangers
of keeping terror suspects in jail where, much like mafia bosses before them,
prison is seen as a prime territory for recruiting and networking.
“I think we have developed experience in how to deal with a
criminal network. We have lots of undercover agents who do a great job of
intercepting communication,” she said.
While Italians authorities are seen as having broad powers,
police do not have special powers to detain terror suspects without charge.
Terror suspects may be held for up to four days without charge, just like any
other suspect. However, Italy has been criticised by the European court of
human rights for holding defendants too long once they have been charged and
are awaiting trial.
Galli said there was no groundswell of concern about whether
Italy’s tactics violated civil liberties. The broad use of surveillance –
including intercepted communication – is seen as sufficiently targeted to terror
and mafia suspects, unlike public criticism in Italy of sweeping data
collection methods used in the US and UK.
Friday 23 June 2017 09.26 BST)
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