Former Ilva, first instance sentence annulled.Bonelli:“Is pollution an invention?”

The Taranto branch of the Assize Court of Appeal of Lecce moved the proceedings to Potenza, deeming the Taranto judges "offended parties"

ROME - The first degree sentence in the trial against 37 defendants and three companies for the alleged environmental disaster caused by the former Ilva during the years of Riva's management has been annulled. The Taranto branch of the Court of Assizes of Appeal of Lecce accepted the defenders' request to move the proceedings to Potenza as the Taranto judges who issued the first degree sentence should be considered 'offended parties'.

The national spokesperson for Green Europe, Angelo Bonelli, said he was “astonished!Was pollution an invention? Do deaths and illnesses have no responsibility? This is not justice.With this decision, yet another wound is inflicted on Taranto after the health disaster.The data speaks clearly.In Taranto, over the years, 93% of the dioxin produced in Italy was released into the atmosphere, together with 67% of the lead, according to what was reported in the ISPRA Ines register, which later became E-PRTR.This dramatic environmental situation pushed, on 4 March 2010, the health authority to ban grazing within a 20 km radius of the steelworks.We are facing one of the most serious health and environmental disasters in Italian and European history, which has caused too many victims, especially among children.The epidemiological investigation by the Istituto Superiore di Sanità confirms this unequivocally.Today, this sentence which annuls what was established in the first instance does not represent an act of justice, but a wound inflicted on those who have already paid a very high price with their health and their lives".