The leader of the popular party Manfred Weber cancels the Naples convention: “Support for Kiev is not an optional”. Cav’s reply: “Instead of criticizing me, they open a table for peace”
A new Weber case breaks out in Forza Italia. With a tweet in the early afternoon, the Bavarian president of the EPP announced the cancellation of the study days in Naples scheduled for next June ”following Berlusconi’s declarations on Ukraine”. As soon as they read the news on social media, the blue MEPs go into fibrillation and meet in Brussels to take stock of the situation: they hear Antonio Tajani, the Cav is informed. The line is only one, harshly condemning: ”Weber’s words are unacceptable, Fi and Berlusconi have always supported Kiev without any ambiguitywith facts, i.e. with the votes in the Italian and European Parliaments in support of Ukraine, starting with the shipment of arms.
In Arcore they are surprised by the behavior of the president of the parliamentary group of the European Populars, also because “it has never happened that the EPP makes a statement, even a simple tweet, without first informing the delegation concerned”, as denounced by an enraged Alessandra Mussolini , who then jokes: ”They don’t want to come to Naples? Worse for them, they will lose a great opportunity to eat well and see a splendid land…”.
But there is not much desire to joke in the blue house: the attempt to marginalize Berlusconi and ‘overthrow’ his leadership is strong, they say, perhaps leveraging on the internal divisions of Fi, as part of a broader and more precise operation, which sees Weber among its protagonists in ‘unloading’ the force leader. There is, in short, the belief that the president of the EPP does not act alone and someone even suspects that he has an axis with Giorgia Meloniincreasingly tempted by the idea of an alliance between the conservatives of the ECR and the Popolari, perhaps with Tajani’s side, to create an alternative to the socialists and overturn the political geography within the EU Parliament.
The latter scenario is denied by the Melonians: Giorgia does not need pontieri in her place or to work together with someone, and, in any case, her position on Ukraine, like that of the entire Italian government, is very clear: full support for Kiev against the invasion of Moscow, no ifs, ands or buts. Sources of the Ppe, then, exclude that the decision to desert Naples was agreed with Tajani.
As the hours go by, the case mounts more and more. Also because it remains a fact, they say, that the tenor of Cav’s statements on Zelensky and the Ukrainian conflictdespite the various denials, they did not go down at all to the so-called eastern front of the Ppe. In this regard, Italian sources wonder why Weber, whom they consider weak within him, has not opened a confrontation with the Baltic countries and tried to make moral suasion pro Fi.
The force barrage continued throughout the day to reiterate that ”Berlusconi has always worked for peace”. Hence the request to Weber to ”apologise” and to the Ppe to “clear up the misunderstanding immediately”. After having heard the Cav, the Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Antonio intervenes Tajani via twitter: ”Berlusconi is Fi, Fi is Berlusconi, I therefore do not agree with the decision to postpone the meeting in Naples“. But that’s not all. In the evening, the blue leader makes himself heard with a post on Fb, where he remarks that he is “criticized” only because he “wants peace”, in the face of the real risk of nuclear war.
Source-www.adnkronos.com