Ukraine aid vote divides opposition. Pd, M5 and Third pole: three documents

The European Council on Foreign Affairs and Defense will take place in Brussels, on the 23rd and 24th of March, where the question of Ukraine will return to the table with a possible new shipment of arms to Kiev. Giorgia Meloni, in preparation for the summit, will report to the Senate today at 11:30 am and Wednesday at 9:30 am to the House. At the end of communications from the main Brothers in Italy, Lega and Forza Italia will present a joint resolution. Oppositions will be divided, with the 5 Star Movement, the Democratic Party and the Third Pole presenting three different address documents.

The 5 Star Movement will vote no. The line of pentastellati does not change, they also voted against it on January 11th in the Senate, when the decree was approved with 125 yes, 28 no and 2 abstentions. Then Senator Grillino Ettore Licheri said: “The M5S will no longer vote to send weapons to Ukraine and with his head held high he says long live peace, long live Ukraine”. Words that were also fulfilled during the January 24 vote in the Chamber, when the decree was approved with 215 yes and 46 no, establishing the transfer of arms to Kiev until December 31, 2023. On the occasion, Marco Pellegrini, M5S group leader at the Defense Commission in Montecitorio, denounced: «What will we do when Zelensky asks us not only for weapons, but also for men? Those who talk of peace and at the same time embrace the path of military escalation are hypocrites. Tell citizens the truth: Italy and Europe are at war.
Have the courage to say it.”

Giuseppe Conte, leader of Five Stars, will maintain the same line also useful for gaining credit as the only party against military support for Kiev, along with the Italian Left-Green Alliance. A way to continue his personal war to win over the left electorate at the expense of Schlein’s PD.

The secretary of the Democratic Party would have found a “tightrope” solution in order not to contradict her pacifist position and, at the same time, not to betray her Atlanticist orientation. The bottom-of-the-circle solution believes in “the right of the Ukrainian people to self-defense”, but wants to exclude the new arms shipment. The fair of indecision is completed with the request for the Government to ask the European Community bodies to promote a diplomatic initiative in favor of peace.
If there is a split vote, Democrats are hoping to find 5-Star support for that request.
On the issue of sending weapons, Schlein took an alternate position. On February 24, 2022, the day of the invasion, as Vice President of Emilia-Romagna, he tweeted that: «Putin’s attack on Ukraine is a criminal act that will cost human lives and suffering, especially among civilians.

The EU and Italy, which rejects the war, must respond firmly and unambiguously together. Every effort and international mobilization is needed to end this madness.”

Then, on March 18, in La Repubblica, he reiterated: “I think peace is not made with weapons”, but leaving an open door: “I have no desire to demonize anyone who responded to a specific request from the Ukrainian resistance”.

To then reach September 25, also in 2022, when he voted in favor of sending weapons until the end of 2023, voting against the M5S and Avs resolutions that asked the government to suspend the supply of weapons to Ukraine. Last stop: January 24, 2023, when you vote in favor of converting into law the decree-law that extended the sending of military aid to Ukrainians for the entire year 2023. Therefore, today they will vote in favor: Pd and Third Pole, while the 5 Star Movement will continue on the line without. Most rejoice, Alfredo Antoniozzi, deputy leader of the FdI group in the Chamber, declared: “Pd and Cinque Stelle will no longer be de facto allies, when Parliament discusses the war in Ukraine and the two parties express themselves in totally different positions” .