PARIS - “No one in the Italian government is looking for vendettas or trophies,” said a statement from Palazzo Chigi regarding Italy’s as yet un-granted requests for extradition of the terrorists from the ‘Years of Lead’, arrested in France on Wednesday, but Italy is still fervently seeking justice for the nine former terrorists in custody in Paris, reports La Repubblica.

  After the seven were arrested on Wednesday, two more, Luigi Bergamin and Raffaele Ventura handed themselves in on Thursday. According to sources from French judicial authorities, they both arrived separately at Paris’ Palais de Justice with their lawyers. Maurizio Di Marzio is the only one of the group of ten former terrorists wanted by the Italian government still on the run, some suggesting he is waiting for the charges against him to expire on May 10.

  However, the nine in custody have all now been released on bail, with the judge ruling that they are no longer flight risks.

  Bergami was declared by Italian prosecutors a ‘habitual offender’, a status which makes it possible for a criminal to be convicted even after charges against him from the 1970s might have expired. 

  Meanwhile, many intellectuals in France have signed a petition encouraging French President Emmanuel Macron to reject Italy’s requests for extradition, and many members of the public have also expressed support for this, online and through protest.

  The process to decide upon extradition begins on Wednesday in the Court of Appeals in Paris, and will consider each of the cases one by one.

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