Italian newspaper backs pro-EU stance against ‘bitter secession’
AN influential Italian newspaper has endorsed Scottish independence as a bulwark against nationalist populism.
Rome’s Il Foglio in a front page editorial by its editor Giuliano Ferrara has described Scotland as “the last refuge of true European patriotism”. The paper even ran two Saltires on its masthead
Il Foglio is just the latest in Europe to contrast the SNP’s Scottish pro-EU nationalism and British anti-EU nationalism since Brexit. Earlier this week France’s Le Telegramme referred to this as the “paradoxe britannique”.
Mr Ferrara wrote: “For the moment, European patriotism, with problems, is seeking refuge in Edinburgh and Glasgow in the form of a happy independentism in conflict with the bitter secessionism of the Midlands.”
The veteran journalist, a former politician in expremier Silvio Berlusconi’s party, described Scotland as “that magnificent corner of Europe where even Caesar did not reach”.
Referring to the European Union, he said added: “Perhaps the time has come to try to understand how Scotland has became a haven for a humanist project, which while controversial carried peace and hope as well as problems”.
There has been substantial interest in Scotland in Italy this week Former First Minister Alex Salmond featured Milan’s Il Giorno under the headline “Scotland wants Europe”. The paper described him as the “paladin of independence”.
But it was his successor, Nicola Sturgeon, who is winning the most plaudits for her stance on both independence and EU membership.
Her announcement of a new referendum last week was welcomed by liberal Europhiles as part of a fightback that also included this week’s defeat of the far right in the Netherlands. “From Holland to Scotland, Europe is at last getting tired of populism” was the headline in online investigative newspaper Linkiesta. Ms Sturgeon’s “stay in Europe” referendum, it suggested, was part of a fightback involving Dutch resistance and coming elections in France and Germany.
Such praise for the SNP comes just a few short years after the party was more commonly associated with right-wing secessionism in Italy. Back in 2012, Rome’s La Repubblica attacked Mr Salmond. “He looks less like Braveheart.” the paper said of the former FM, “and more like Chief O’Hara, the corpulent and easy-going police chief in Mickey Mouse cartoons”.