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Italy seeks to call off Nato talks for fear of more riots By Bruce Johnston in Rome (Filed: 08/08/2001)

THE Italian government, still licking its wounds after violence at last month's G8 summit, began urgent talks yesterday to consider cancelling a planned Nato meeting after threats of further anti-capitalist protests.

Nato defence ministers are due to meet in Naples on Sept 26. At the top of their agenda is Washington's "Son of Star Wars" missile defence project.

A Naples-based protest network which was active in Genoa last month, Rete No Global, has called on all anti-capitalist groups to converge on the city and "set up a huge demonstration to be concluded with the siege of [the conference]."

Francesco Caruso, leader of the network, said of the Nato leaders: "They have their missiles, bombs, space shields. We have the strength of our arguments."

The group said the protests would be peaceful, but some activists have given warning that the Nato gathering could provoke "urban warfare". The Italian government is now considering whether to call for the meeting to be moved to another country.

The deliberations came only days after the administration in Rome said it was seeking to transfer a planned United Nations conference on hunger to a Third World city because it feared violence.

Silvio Berlusconi, the Prime Minister, whose conservative coalition has been rocked by claims of police incompetence and brutality in Genoa, is reported to be convinced that the Nato meeting poses a serious enough threat to law and order for the venue to be re-examined.

Rosa Russo Jervolino, the mayor of Naples, said she feared that the climate was "too tense" in Italy for a Nato meeting, and that she would prefer it to be postponed. No matter what the decision was, she added, "Naples will not be cordoned off [like Genoa was]. I will not militarise Naples."

The calls to move the meetings - "to deny a stage to the violent protesters", as the Foreign Ministry has argued - has sparked a fierce debate. The Centre-Left opposition has demanded that Italy must meet its international obligations and hold the conferences.

Critics of the government have argued that, by rethinking the matter, Mr Berlusconi is acting out of fear and a superficial assessment of a problem - a move "unworthy of a serious Western government".

The debate has also divided the ruling Centre-Right coalition. Antonio Martino, the Defence Minister, distanced himself from the government in a radio interview yesterday, saying he "personally" wanted the Nato meeting to go ahead as planned.

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2001