Far-right ex-mayor of Rome unlikely prison campaigner

Far-right, fresh out of jail, and teamed up with a man who wants criminals to "rot" behind bars: Italy's Gianni Alemanno is ​an unlikely champion of prisoners' rights, as he seeks to balance a tough stance on law and order with concern ‌for human rights.

The 68-year-old has a solid right-wing political profile, starting in the youth wing of the post-fascist MSI party, serving under late Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi as minister of agriculture, and as mayor of Rome from 2008 to 2013.

Alemanno was released on June 24 from Rome's overcrowded, run-down Rebibbia prison — one of Italy's biggest — 18 months after being jailed to serve a conviction for influence-peddling and abuse of office. He had denied the charges.

His experience — which he chronicled on ​social media — has cast a fresh spotlight on Italy's neglected prisons, among the most overcrowded in Europe, with an ⁠occupancy rate of nearly 140%.

"Only those who have spent time inside, or have relatives inside, understand the issue with prisons. Others do not understand it, ​they don't see it at all," Alemanno told Reuters in an interview.

With his regained freedom, Alemanno joined forces with Roberto Vannacci, a former army general and anti-woke campaigner ​whose new far-right party is steadily gaining in opinion polls - and whose views on prisons are far from libertarian.

Meeting Alemanno on the evening of his ​release, Vannacci made his hawkish views clear, invoking the Biblical story about brothers Abel and Cain, in which the latter kills his younger sibling.

"Between Abel and Cain, I'm ‌with Abel, ⁠and Cain should rot in prison," Vannacci told reporters. "For serious crimes, people definitely deserve a rigorous, serious, and prolonged sentence."

-Reuters