TRIESTE: CONTINUES THE SUSPENSION OF THE FREE ZONES IN THE NORTHERN FREE PORT
In Trieste the new year [2013] begins with an arbitrary, illegal decision.
Once again, the provisional Italian authorities have paralyzed the free zone in the Northern Sector of Trieste’s international Free Port.
There is a new Commissioner of the Italian Government and Prefect in town. Her name is Francesca Adelaide Garufi. However, just like her predecessor, she suspended the Northern Free Port’s free zone regime.
Hence paralyzing a vital free zone. One more year of lost revenues and lost jobs.
Why? To economically annihilate Trieste and its international Free port.
Indeed, paralyzing, suffocating, ultimately destroying the only international Free Port in the world sounds like a very bad idea. Especially because this legal status is not one State’s decision. It is enshrined in thee multilateral 1947 Treaty of Peace with Italy.
Trieste’s port, with its custom free zones and tax advantages, has the potential to become a hot spot for international trade.
However, local politicians seem unaware of it (or pretend to). They would rather pretend that this precious port belongs to the nearby Italian State rather than exercising the correct temporary civil administration of the Free Territory of Trieste (which they call “province of Trieste“).
This “patriotic” repressive regime dates back to the Cold War Era. However, having long survived its geopolitic scope, it now lives in close symbiosis with the similar, mafia-like criminal cartels of bordering Italy (which still do not enjoy its same abnormal immunities).
In 2012 this counter-politics hit Trieste very hard, attempting to divert the EU-endorsed Baltic-Adriatic corridor and its fundamental freight trades away from Trieste. All valuables are all going to Venice, Ancona, Bari, and Taranto. Trieste is turning into a second-class port for fuel, waste, and LNG terminals.
This well-planned operation to dismantle and spoil Trieste continues because the local political establishment is as corrupt as it is opportunistic.
An unchanged, unchangeable establishment that betrayed its own people. Unscrupulous profiters ready to shield under the Italian flag, proclaiming to be Italy’s protector in a “redeemed” land (this, you guess it, is the source of their unique immunities).
But 2012 was more than this. It was also the year that many people of Trieste awakened. They are those who believe in international law and legality, those who call for compliance with the 1947 Italian Peace Treaty that the local administering authorities and tax collectors ignore. The Treaty that makes it independent.
May 2013 be the year we get back our freedom. FREE TRIESTE!
Translated from blog “Environment and Legality” by Roberto Giurastante