Italian P.M. faces full-scale inquiry

Press, 14 June 1980, Page 9

Italian P.M. faces full-scale inquiry

NZPA-Reuter Rome The Italian Prime Minister (Mr Francesco Cossiga) yesterday faced demands for his impeachment after Parliament decided to hold a full inquiry into allegations that he helped an urban guerrilla suspect to escape arrest.

By yesterday 4OO members of both Houses — well over the one-third required — had demanded a full investigation into the accusations that he helped the suspect, the son of a political colleague, to flee the country.

The suspect, Marco DonatCattin, is son of Carlo DonatCattin, former vice-secretary of Mr Cossiga’s Christian Democratic Party, who resigned last month over the

charge that he nad warned Marco that he faced arrest.

According to a jailed terrorist friend of Marco, the original tip-off for the warning came from the Prime Minister.

Both politicians have denied the allegation, and a Christian Democrat-led parliamentary committee last month voted narrowly to drop the affair. But the Communists and other Left-wing parties joined the neo-fascists to accuse the committee of a cover-up.

They said that they saw discrepancies in Mr Cossiga’s and Mr Donat-Cattin’s versions of the facts and called for a full investigation by Parliament, a pr ,: minary to anv impeachment process. Under the Constitution,

they' had six days from Thursday to collect the necessary signatures, but it took only six hours. . Although Mr Cossiga’s lcoalition allies have said they I will support him, their continued loyalty will depend lon how well he and other witnesses dispel suspicions about the affair. The next move appears to lie with the Christian Democrats, who have not yet made any comment on the new’ parliamentary inquiry. However. they are unlikely to repeat their tactic at the committee stage of trying to brush it almost contemptuously aside. Proceedings may not begin until September or October, after Parliament’s summer recess.