Italy raises pressure on Brazil over Battisti extradition

Diplomatic row intensifies after outgoing Brazilian president refuses to extradite leftist rebel convicted of four murders
Cesare Battisti
Italian former militant Cesare Battisti in Brazil in 2007. The outgoing Brazilian president turned down an Italian extradition request for Battisti who was convicted for four murders in the 1970s. Photograph: Evaristo Sa/AFP/Getty Images

Italy stepped up pressure on Brazil todayto extradite fugitive rebel Cesare Battisti, with new EU diplomatic efforts, a planned sit-in at Brazil's embassy and a meeting between Silvio Berlusconi and the son of one of Battisti's victims.

On Friday, Brazil's president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, began a fierce diplomatic row by refusing on his last day in office to extradite Battisti.

The Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, stressed that diplomatic relations with Brazil remained unchanged but after meeting Alberto Torregiani, whose father was killed in 1979, he said Italy considered the case a matter of justice that it would pursue at all levels.

Battisti, a former leftist rebel, was convicted in absentia of four murders carried out in the late 1970s. He lived as a fugitive in Mexico and France before fleeing in 2004 to Brazil, where he was arrested in 2007 on an Interpol warrant.

Battisti has admitted participating in a rebel group but denies ever shooting anyone. He has repeatedly said he fears persecution if sent back to Italy.

Italy has denounced Lula's decision and said it would pursue all judicial means in Brazil to reverse it; the Brazilian supreme court is to rule on the legality of Lula's decision.

The Italian government indicated today it was taking the matter to the European Union. The foreign minister, Franco Frattini, met Italy's recalled ambassador to Brazil and Italy's EU representative to study European legal options to pressure Brazil to turn Battisti over, the foreign ministry said in a statement.

It wasn't clear what the EU could do. "It is basically a bilateral issue," said European commission spokesman Michael Mann, adding that general rules on extradition made it difficult for the EU to get involved.

The Italian foreign ministry disputed that, saying: "The case is far more complex and one cannot exclude, including in the coming hours, a European initiative proposed by Italy on the question."

Meanwhile, a sit-in was planned today in front of Brazil's embassy to Italy in Rome's central Piazza Navona. A group involved in the protest, the Res Movement, has proposed a boycott of Brazilian products to press the Battisti case.

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