Free Trieste

2016: Free Trieste’s sit in on the Italy – Trieste border crossing.

This April weekend we stand on the Free Territory of Trieste‘s State border. Our sit-ins take place in the Northern sector, on the Trieste – Italy border.

After the first day, a crowded Saturday, it’s time to start again. Our people stayed here all the night, continuing the sit-in on the former San Giovanni di Duino – Štivan border crossing.

1950s: the State border between Trieste and Italy.

This border cuts the Burgo paper mill in half: this means that when Trieste’s rightful provisional administration is restored, this factory might be subject to two different taxations. On one side, the “light” one, the Free Territory;s taxation. On the other side, the “heavy” Italian taxation.

A true paradox, an outright Italian-style mess. One that needs a quick solution.

Would the paper mill’s management board keep it where it is taxed the most?

Yesterday, on the 17th [April 2016] in Italy took place a referendum on oil drilling in the Adriatic sea. There were polling stations also in Trieste, however, they are illegitimate: again, the city belongs to its own, independent State.

This means that the decision of some of Trieste’s people to spend that Sunday on the border with Italy underlines their rejection of illegal Italian election in the Free Territory of Trieste. Standing on the existing border means standing for sovereignty, and citizenship. The Free Territory’s, of course, not Italy’s.

On Sunday, Free Trieste hosted the first visit around the Free State’s borderline, recently cleaned up by the Movement’s own activists. A five hours of trail, from the border with Slovenia to the border crossing at San Giovanni di Duino, about 3 Kms. But it is five exciting hours anyone who, for the first time, discovers the existence of this border and of their identity as a citizen of a Free State.

Old boundary stones of the Allied Military Government (AMG FTT) appear from the grass. They are finally rescued from their previous abandonment.

New border signs appear next to the AMG FTT’s, as a sign of continuity: it is the triangulation points that Free Trieste’s activists signed with stakes.

On Sunday, 17 April 2016, I stood on the Free Territory of Trieste’s border. I am a citizens of the Free Territory of Trieste.

Translated from blog “Ambiente e Legalità” – Environment and Legality by Roberto Giurastante

…it is the triangulation points that Free Trieste’s activists signed with stakes.