April 25 still fails to be a moment of national unity for Italy. And after the controversies of the past between parties that have made the Liberation Day an element of division, on the 77th anniversary the Anpi and its president are at the center of the clash Gianfranco Pagliarulo with the distinction between the Italian and Ukrainian resistance, the no to sending weapons to Kiev and more generally to rearmament.
After two years the processions return
After the suspension caused by the Covid pandemic, the celebrations are back with parades. Starting from that of Milanoa national demonstration in which the banners of the partisan and combatant associations, of the National Association of ex deportees in the Nazi concentration camps and of the Jewish Brigade will parade as usual.
Pagliarulo at the center of the controversy
In Milan, Gold Medal for the Resistance, as per historical traction there will be a procession from Corso Venezia to Piazza Duomo and a final rally in which Tetyana Bandelyuk will also intervene, a Ukrainian worker for some time in Italy who left her family in her Village. There will be also Pagliarulo. In recent days, after the controversy sparked by his 2015 posts in which he defined the “US-funded regime of Kiev” as “Nazi”, president Anpi was forced to publicly reiterate his opposition to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, condemning Putin’s actions “firmly”. “We are under an unprecedented media attack,” he said, speaking of articles and cartoons against the association he has headed since 2020.
But the criticisms had already begun to rain in mid-April, when in the press conference to present the celebrations for the Liberation, the newly confirmed president of the Anpi, strong of the re-election with almost the unanimity of the Congress, had condemned the rearmament of the Ukraine (“there is a risk of catastrophe”) and reiterated that “the resistance of Kiev cannot be compared to that of Italy”.
Sala: the president Anpi clarifies
Pagliaruolo was most recently pressed by the Milanese mayor Beppe Sala. «I would like – he said – that he would clarify his thoughts in these days and maybe it would help a little the serenity of that date». Sala, who reiterates his position: “I believe that we must be unequivocally on the side of Ukraine, I believe it is correct to provide them with the weapons to fight, on the other hand we celebrate the Liberation that was not obtained with daisies in hand” .