€600,000 to Fiore’s neo-fascist organisation, the EP launches a procedure to stop the funds

Strasbourg – The European Parliament wants to understand whether the financing granted to the pan-European party composed of fascists, neo-Nazi and negationists led by Roberto Fiore is to be considered as legitimate. One fourth of MePs, belonging to PPE, S&D, Alde and Gue, signed a request for having the issue discussed by the Committee on Constitutional Affairs first and then in the Plenary, with a vote which could rule that the organisation has to give back the funds. Yes, the fact is that that funds are available for Fiore’s organisation, which could ask for them to be released, with the possibility for the EP at the end of the parliamentary procedure to ask back the money it issued.

When Eunews published the news on April 25, there was a bloom of indignation. Several MePs, like Sergio Cofferati, Elly Schlein, David Sassoli and Curzio Maltese said they were committed in stopping a provision which had already been authorised by the EP bureau, the highest administrative decision body of the Parliament, composed of the President Martin Schulz, 14 Vice Presidents (including the Italians Antonio Tajani and David Sassoli) and five quaestors.

The problem is that the first analysis when granting a financing is done only with an examination of the statute of the organisation. The foundation Europa Terra Nostra, and the European party Alliance for Peace and Freedom (Afp), founded by the neo-fascist Roberto Fiore, “had tried to obtain public funds over the years, without getting them. Yet, this year they filed their application with a statute written expressly to pass the examination made by the EP,” told us a source of the European Parliament.

Yesterday, though, thanks to a last-minute petition, an official appeal for verification of the funding was submitted to the Conference of Committee Chairs, which approved the request. This means the neo-fascist organisation will be heard at the Constitutional Affairs and the legitimacy of this financing will be subject to the opinion of a committee of warrantor composed of three independent personalities chosen in each one of the three EU institutions respectively: Commission, Council and Parliament. After the hearing, the Committee will write an opinion concerning the convenience of granting the fund, which will then be discussed in the Parliament, where it will undergo a vote with a simple majority consultation. It will then be up to the highest assembly of the Parliament to decide whether to grant the fund or not.

Still, this procedure wasn’t convincing for everyone – that’s why the Greens, even though they are clearly anti-fascists, did not adhere to the petition, being afraid for the creation of a dangerous precedent. Fiore’s organisations, in fact, wouldn’t be punished as fascists, but as clearly anti-European. Several parties in the European Parliament – even Gue itself, which participated the petition – could be subject to the same procedure in the future, seeing their potential future financings denied.