ROME - A Bologna court has appealed to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) on the ruling of what constitutes a safe country. The issue at hand is whether the Italian or European legislation should prevail in the case of a Bangladeshi illegal migrant. 

 The court in Bologna has asked for clarification over two questions. First, what defines a safe country. Second, whether the ruling of European courts requires that in the event of a conflict between the regulations, the EU rules prevails.

 The issue of what defines a safe country comes as new Italian legislation defines a safe country as a country where the majority of the population lives in conditions that are said to be safe. This definition has sparked protest as it could have been used to described Nazi Germany as safe, given Nazi Germany had been extremely safe for the vast majority of the German population, with the exception of Jews, homosexuals and political opponents. 

 This appeal to the ECJ is in relation to a case with a Bangladeshi migrant. Bangladesh is one of the 19 newly approved safe countries along with: Albania, Algeria, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cape Verde, Cote d'Ivoire, Egypt, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Morocco, Montenegro, Peru, Senegal, Serbia, Sri Lanka and Tunisia.

 The new legislation recalls that Bangladesh is a country where protection is granted to LGBTQ+ community members, victims of gender violence, ethnic and religious minorities and people forcibly displaced by weather-related events. 

 Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini has strongly criticised this decision to appeal to the ECJ: “There cannot be judges who dismantle in the evening what others do in the morning. We are also sick of working, as the citizens ask of us, to bring more security, to have some communist judge, that is, who believes that borders are not needed and that laws are not needed, and that everyone has the right to do what they want". 

 Others have shown their support for the most recent ruling. Riccardo Magi of +Europa has said that “Meloni and Piantedosi are trying for the umpteenth time to bypass the obligations deriving from European law that they themselves know to be insurmountable. Other than victims: they are the ones who deliberately go to head-on confrontation with the judiciary.”

 Nicola Fratoianni, leader of the Italian Left, spoke similarly: "When you don't want to recognise reality, when every opportunity is set to make bad propaganda, when you decide not to respect international standards, it's obvious that sooner or later you'll find yourself in the mess".

tjpw