30 Jahre nach dem Tag des Mauerfalls, eine neue Friedensrevolution in Berlin

Tens of thousands of people from all over Europe and many more from within Germany began reaching Berlin, the capital city, over the last two days to take part in today’s gigantic expression of peaceful protest against the social, economic, personal and cultural restrictions imposed by the German government in the name of public health.

Today’s massive march in Berlin is taking place after a very tense week, with the Berlin Administrative Court ruling just over a day earlier that today’s ‘Assembly for Freedom’ protest could take place without attracting a ban on any grounds. The Court argued that the government’s stated rationale for the ban – an imminent threat to public health and safety – was baseless.

Here is a selection of the coverage from outlets that I follow regularly (Deutsch -> English).

Corona-Protest: Erst verleumdet, dann verboten – Die Berliner Versammlungsbehörde hat für das Wochenende geplante Demonstrationen von Kritikern der Corona-Politik verboten, wie Medien berichten. Diese Entscheidung ist aus mehreren Gründen falsch: Die Begründung erweckt den Eindruck, als sollten mit dem mutmaßlich vorgeschobenen Argument des Infektionsschutzes politische Äußerungen unterdrückt werden. Sie erweckt den Eindruck, als wolle sich der Berliner Senat zum Schiedsrichter bei der Beurteilung von Protest-Inhalten machen, nach dem Motto „Gute Demos, Schlechte Demos“, das die NachDenkSeiten etwa in diesem Artikel beschrieben haben . Das Verbot bleibt auch dann falsch, wenn man sich mit den Demo-Inhalten nicht identifizieren sollte: Solange keine justiziablen Äußerungen von den Veranstaltern bekannt sind, darf der Inhalt kein Kriterium für das Gewähren des Demonstrationsrechts sein. Das Argument des Infektionsschutzes erscheint, wie gesagt, vorgeschoben.

“Corona protest: first slandered, then banned – The Berlin assembly authorities have banned demonstrations planned for the weekend by critics of the Corona policy, according to media reports. This decision is wrong for several reasons: The reasoning gives the impression that political statements are to be suppressed with the presumably advanced argument of infection protection. It gives the impression that the Berlin Senate wants to make itself the arbitrator in the evaluation of protest content, according to the motto “good demos, bad demos”, which the NachDenkSeiten have described in this article. The ban remains false even if one should not identify with the demo contents: As long as no justifiable statements are known by the organizers, the contents may not be a criterion for granting the right to demonstrate. The argument of protection against infection appears, as already mentioned, to be a pretext.”

Inakzeptabler Angriff auf eines unserer höchsten Grundrechte – Die deutsche Hauptstadt verbietet Demonstrationen gegen die Corona-Regeln der Bundesregierung und der Länder. Das ist ein inakzeptabler Angriff auf eines unserer höchsten Grundrechte, gegen jede Verhältnismäßigkeit und obendrein an politischer Dummheit kaum zu überbieten. Eine unbequeme, in Teilen extrem unappetitliche, aber vor allem (noch) eher kleine Gruppe wird hier in die Lage versetzt, sich als Kämpfer für unser Grundgesetz aufzuspielen. Und die Stadt Berlin hat ihr alle Argumente geschenkt und alle Gefallen getan, die man einer populistischen und wenig geeinten Bewegung schenken und tun kann.

“Unacceptable attack on one of our most fundamental rights – the German capital prohibits demonstrations against the corona rules of the German government and the Länder. This is an unacceptable attack on one of our most fundamental rights, against all proportionality and, on top of that, hard to beat in terms of political stupidity. An uncomfortable, in parts extremely unappetizing, but above all (still) rather small group is put in a position here to act as fighters for our Basic Law. And the city of Berlin has given it all the arguments and done all the favours that one can give and do to a populist and little united movement.”

Berlins Rot-rot-grüne Regierung wählt den Weg der Eskalation – Die Senatsregierung dürfte sich gefragt haben: Wollen wir uns wieder um Zahlen streiten und Nazis im Demozug suchen müssen? Oder wollen wir vom Regen in die Traufe und die Demos gleich ganz verbieten? Man hat sich für letzteres entschieden, als gäbe es keinen dritten Weg, nämlich den des Rechts.
Das muss man sich einmal vorstellen wollen: Die Bundeskanzlerin stellt in Brüssel zur deutschen EU-Ratspräsidentschaft gerade erst die Freiheits- und Grundrechte als hohes Gut „in den Fokus“ ihres Interesses und nur wenige Wochen später demonstrieren Angehörige von Merkels Koalitionspartner (und Möchtegernkoalitionspartner) in der Berliner Senatsregierung, was die Uhr tatsächlich geschlagen hat: Demonstrationen am Wochenende gegen die Corona-Maßnahmen – die im Übrigen ihrem Wesen nach ohnehin längst solche gegen die Merkel-Regierung geworden sind – werden verboten.

“Berlin’s red-red-green government chooses the path of escalation – The Senate government may have wondered: Do we want to argue about numbers again and have to search for Nazis in the Demozug? Or do we want to go from the frying pan into the fire and ban demos altogether? The latter has been chosen as if there were no third way, namely the right.
“You have to want to imagine that: In Brussels on the occasion of Germany’s EU Council Presidency, the German Chancellor has just begun to “focus” her attention on freedom and fundamental rights as a high good, and only a few weeks later members of Merkel’s coalition partner (and would-be coalition partners) in the Berlin Senate government are demonstrating what the clock has actually struck: Weekend demonstrations against the Corona measures – which, by the way, have by their very nature long since become those against the Merkel government anyway – are banned.”

Demonstration der Gegner der Corona-Maßnahmen verboten – Es wäre zu begrüßen, wenn das Gericht von den Behörden Beweise dafür verlangen würde, dass die Demonstrationen der letzten Monate zur Erhöhung der Ansteckungszahlen beigetragen haben. Unerwartet kam die Ankündigung von Berlins Innensenator Andreas Geisel nicht, die für kommenden Samstag geplanten Massendemonstrationen der Corona-Maßnahme-Gegner zu verbieten. Spätestens nachdem am vergangenen Samstag eine antirassistische Demonstration in Hanau zum Gedenken an den rassistischen Mordanschlag kurzfristig verboten wurde (Wie faktenbasiert sind die Demoverbote der letzten Tage), war klar, dass es auch in Berlin eine solche Maßnahme geben wird.

“Demonstration by opponents of the Corona measures banned – It would be welcome if the Court were to ask the authorities to provide evidence that the demonstrations of recent months have contributed to the increase in infection rates. Unexpectedly, the announcement by Berlin’s Senator of the Interior Andreas Geisel to ban the mass demonstrations of Corona opponents planned for next Saturday did not come as a surprise. At the latest after an anti-racist demonstration in Hanau in commemoration of the racist assassination attempt was banned at short notice last Saturday (How fact-based are the demo bans of the last days), it was clear that such a measure will also be taken in Berlin.”

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Italy’s PM under investigation for enforcing ‘lock down’

Italy’s prime minister Giuseppe Conte is now officially under investigation for enforcing a nationwide ‘lock down’ in Italy against the advice of Italy’s scientific committee. The news from Italy, the first democratic country to impose a national lockdown, followed by others, is that the scientific committee recommended against it, but Conte over-ruled the scientific committee and had a ‘lock down’ imposed.

It was 9 March 2020 that the Conte government severely restricted the movement of the population except for necessity, work, and health circumstances. The scientific committee in Italy only recommended masks for those who feel ill. Among the questions to be raised by the investigation are: Who pushed for mandatory masks in public interior spaces? And, who was Conte listening to?

Here is the gist of the startling new developments in Italy, taken from two reports of the newspaper ‘La Repubblica’. The text of the two relevant news reports follows, in Italian, with an output from an automatic translator in English.

The first Repubblica news report, on 13 August, is headlined ‘Notices filed against PM and six ministers’. The main paragraphs are (Italian):

Avviso di garanzia da parte dei pm di Roma nei confronti del presidente del Consiglio Giuseppe Conte e dei ministri Alfonso Bonafede, Luigi Di Maio, Roberto Gualtieri, Lorenzo Guerini, Luciana Lamorgese e Roberto Speranza. Stando a quanto si legge in una nota della presidenza del Consiglio, con questo avviso si comunica la trasmissione al Tribunale dei ministri degli atti di un procedimento nato da varie denunce provenienti da soggetti di varie parti d’Italia per i reati di epidemia, delitti colposi contro la salute, omicidio colposo, abuso d’ufficio, attentato contro la Costituzione, attentato contro i diritti politici del cittadino (artt. 110, 438, 452 e 589, 323, 283, 294 del Codice penale).

Sempre la nota di Palazzo Chigi aggiunge che la Procura di Roma chiederà l’archiviazione: “La trasmissione da parte della Procura al Collegio in base alle previsioni di legge, è un atto dovuto. Nel caso specifico tale trasmissione è stata accompagnata da una relazione nella quale l’Ufficio della Procura ‘ritiene le notizie di testo infondate e dunque da archiviare'”.

(English): Warranty notice from the pm of Rome against the Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte and Ministers Alfonso Bonafede, Luigi Di Maio, Roberto Gualtieri, Lorenzo Guerini, Luciana Lamorgese and Roberto Speranza. According to what is read in a note of the Council Presidency, this notice communicates the transmission to the Court of Ministers of the acts of a procedure born from various complaints from subjects in various parts of Italy for the crimes of epidemic, manslaughter against health, manslaughter, abuse of office, attack against the Constitution, attack against the political rights of the citizen (Articles 110, 438, 452 and 589, 323, 283, 294 of the Penal Code).

The note from Palazzo Chigi also adds that the Rome Public Prosecutor’s Office will ask for the case to be dismissed: “The transmission by the Public Prosecutor’s Office to the College according to the provisions of the law, is a due act. In the specific case this transmission was accompanied by a report in which the Public Prosecutor’s Office ‘considers the news of the text unfounded and therefore to be archived'”.

(IT): Conte e i ministri, inoltre, “si dichiarano sin d’ora disponibili a fornire ai magistrati ogni elemento utile a completare l’iter procedimentale, in uno spirito di massima collaborazione”. Successivamente il premier scrive su Facebook: “Ci siamo sempre assunti la responsabilità, in primis ‘politica’, delle decisioni adottate. Decisioni molto impegnative, a volte sofferte, assunte senza disporre di un manuale, di linee guida, di protocolli di azione. Abbiamo sempre agito in scienza e coscienza, senza la pretesa di essere infallibili ma nella consapevolezza di dover sbagliare il meno possibile per preservare al meglio gli interessi della intera comunità nazionale”.

Come accennato, sono oltre duecento gli esposti e le denunce presentate da cittadini sull’operato del governo nel periodo del lockdowon e dell’emergenza Coronavirus. Gli esposti, passati ai pm Eugenio Albamonte e Giorgio Orano, riguardano due ambiti della gestione da parte del governo: da un lato si accusa l’esecutivo di non aver saputo affrontare l’emergenza. Nel secondo filone sono stati inseriti gli esposti in cui si ipotizzano reati di abuso d’ufficio e attentato contro i diritti politici del cittadino per l’imposizione delle norme legate al lockdown.

(EN): Furthermore, Conte and the ministers “declare themselves willing to provide the magistrates with all the elements necessary to complete the procedure, in a spirit of maximum cooperation”. Subsequently, the Prime Minister writes on Facebook: “We have always taken responsibility, first and foremost ‘politics’, for the decisions taken. Very demanding decisions, sometimes painful, taken without having a manual, guidelines, protocols of action. We have always acted in science and conscience, without the pretension of being infallible, but in the awareness of having to make as little mistake as possible to preserve the interests of the entire national community as best we can”.

As mentioned, there are more than two hundred complaints and complaints from citizens about the government’s actions during the lockdowon and the Coronavirus emergency. The complaints, passed to the pm Eugenio Albamonte and Giorgio Orano, concern two areas of management by the government: on the one hand, the executive is accused of not having been able to deal with the emergency. In the second strand, the complaints have been inserted in which crimes of abuse of office and attack against the political rights of the citizen for the imposition of the rules related to the lockdown.

The earlier Repubblica news report, printed 6 August, is headlined ‘Coronavirus, the scientific committee wanted differentiated measures but Conte decided the lockdown for the whole Italy’. The main paragraphs are:

(IT): Il 7 marzo scorso con un documento riservato inviato al ministro della Salute Roberto Speranza, sull’analisi della situazione epidemiologica, il Comitato tecnico scientificio propone al governo di “adottare due livelli di misure di contenimento: uno nei territori in cui si è osservata maggiore diffusione del virus, l’altro sul territorio nazionale”. Nello specifico: misure più rigorose in Lombardia e nelle province di Parma, Piacenza, Reggio Emilia, Rimini e Modena, Pesaro Urbino, Venezia, Padova, Treviso, Alessandria e Asti”. Due giorni dopo, però, il presidente del Consiglio Conte con il Dpcm del 9 marzo dà il via al lockdown estendendo le stesse misure a tutto il territorio nazionale senza distinzioni e senza citare a giustificazione del provvedimento alcun atto del Comitato tecnico scientifico.

È la novità di maggiore rilievo che emerge dalla lettura dei cinque verbali, per oltre 200 pagine, che sono stati pubblicati sul sito della fondazione Luigi Einaudi, dopo essere stati desecretati dalla Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri. Sono alcuni dei verbali quelli prodotti dal Comitato tecnico scientifico per l’emergenza del Coronavirus e sono alla base delle decisioni prese dall’Esecutivo con i Dpcm. Documenti che che da giorni le opposizioni, e anche il Copasir, chiedevano di rendere pubblici. Pagine pagine firmate dal Comitato istituito con un’ordinanza del capo del dipartimento della Protezione Civile il 3 febbraio scorso. I cinque verbali sono datati 28 febbraio, 1 marzo, 7 marzo, 30 marzo e 9 aprile 2020. Ma non sono tutte. Mancano, ad esempio, le riunioni dai primi giorni di marzo, quelle della mancata zona rossa ad Alzano e Nembro, in Val Seriana.

(EN): On March 7 with a confidential document sent to the Minister of Health Roberto Speranza, on the analysis of the epidemiological situation, the Scientific Technical Committee proposes to the government to “adopt two levels of containment measures: one in the territories where the virus has been observed more widespread, the other on the national territory”. Specifically: more stringent measures in Lombardy and in the provinces of Parma, Piacenza, Reggio Emilia, Rimini and Modena, Pesaro Urbino, Venice, Padua, Treviso, Alessandria and Asti”. Two days later, however, the President of the Count’s Council with the Dpcm of March 9 kicks off the lockdown by extending the same measures to the entire national territory without distinction and without citing any act of the Scientific Technical Committee to justify the measure.

This is the most important news that emerges from the reading of the five minutes, for over 200 pages, which were published on the website of the Luigi Einaudi Foundation, after having been declassified by the Presidency of the Council of Ministers. Some of the minutes are those produced by the Scientific Technical Committee for the emergency of the Coronavirus and are the basis of the decisions taken by the Executive with the Dpcm. Documents that for days the oppositions, and also the Copasir, were asking to make public. Pages pages signed by the Committee established by an order of the head of the Department of Civil Protection on February 3. The five minutes are dated 28 February, 1 March, 7 March, 30 March and 9 April 2020. But they are not all. There are, for example, the meetings since the first days of March, those of the missing red zone in Alzano and Nembro, in Val Seriana.

(IT): In un passaggio di questi verbali contenenti “informazioni non classificate controllate”, quello del primo marzo in una delle riunioni dopo l’esplosione del coronavirus in Italia, si legge che “il Cts esprime la raccomandazione generale che la popolazione, per tutta la durata dell’emergenza, debba evitare, nei rapporti interpersonali, strette di mano e abbracci”. Il 9 marzo, poi, il premier Giuseppe Conte avrebbe annunciato il lockdown.

Ieri sera alle 21.15 erano stati trasmessi tramite PEC dal Capo della Protezione Civile Angelo Borrelli agli avvocati Enzo Palumbo, Andrea Pruiti Ciarello e Rocco Mauro Todero. Il Governo – si legge sul sito della Fondazione – ha pertanto deciso di rivedere la propria posizione, anticipando il prevedibile esito dell’udienza collegiale fissata per il 10 settembre 2020, innanzi alla Terza Sezione del Consiglio di Stato e aderire alle richieste degli avvocati, fortemente rilanciate dalla Fondazione Luigi Einaudi e sostenute da molti parlamentari e da gran parte dell’opinione pubblica. La Fondazione Luigi Einaudi auspica che il Governo compia l’ulteriore passo sulla strada della trasparenza e pubblichi autonomamente tutti gli altri verbali del Comitato Tecnico Scientifico, utilizzati a supporto dei vari DPCM adottati dal Presidente del Consiglio dei Ministri Giuseppe Conte, nel corso della pandemia da Covid-19.

Da parte sua, il ministro della Salute Roberto Speranza all’informativa al Senato, ha detto che “la Presidenza del Consiglio ha già provveduto a consegnare i verbali del Cts a chi ne ha fatto richiesta e la regola della trasparenza è quella cui non intendiamo rinunciare”.

(EN): In a passage of these minutes containing “controlled unclassified information”, that of March 1st in one of the meetings after the coronavirus explosion in Italy, we read that “the Cts expresses the general recommendation that the population, for the whole duration of the emergency, should avoid, in interpersonal relations, handshakes and hugs”. On March 9, then, Premier Giuseppe Conte announced the lockdown.

Yesterday evening at 9.15 p.m. were transmitted through PEC by the Head of Civil Protection Angelo Borrelli to lawyers Enzo Palumbo, Andrea Pruiti Ciarello and Rocco Mauro Todero. The Government – it can be read on the Foundation’s website – has therefore decided to review its position, anticipating the expected outcome of the collegial hearing scheduled for September 10, 2020, before the Third Section of the Council of State and adhere to the requests of the lawyers, strongly relaunched by the Luigi Einaudi Foundation and supported by many parliamentarians and a large part of public opinion. The Luigi Einaudi Foundation hopes that the Government will take a further step towards transparency and will independently publish all the other minutes of the Technical Scientific Committee, used to support the various Prime Ministerial Decree adopted by the Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte during the Covid-19 pandemic.

For his part, the Health Minister Roberto Speranza, at the information to the Senate, said that “the Presidency of the Council has already provided to deliver the minutes of the Cts to those who requested them and the rule of transparency is the one we do not intend to give up”.