ITALIAN DRAMA

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXIV, Issue 38, 13 January 1944, Page 5

ITALIAN DRAMA

EXECUTION OF FASCISTS.

LONDON SURPRISED. LONDON, Jan. 11. The summary execution of Count C'iano alter a brief trial in the Fascist Court at Verona came as a surprise to London, where the dramatic close of the career of this onco spectacular Foreign Minister is regarded as one of the historically outstanding events of the war. Details of the trial and execution are very sparse and they come mostly from the Rome' radio, which stated that tho five • men shot to-day received religious assistance from the prison chaplain and a Franciscan friar. "Ciano, before being sentenced, said: 'I may have made a mistake, but don't accuse me of treason.' The indicted 19 were accused of treason, aiding the enemy, betraying the ideals of Fascism, attempting to jeopardise the derations of the country's armed forces, the country's resistance and independence. Aldo Vacchini presided over the court, which was composed of seven members." Another Rome radio broadcast stated that Sforza, ex-Secretary of the Fascist Party, was one of the witnesses. The radio added thai. Ciano also said to the court that he would never have signed the decree calling for Mussolini's resignation had he foreseen the consequences. Ciano added that he asked Marshal Badoglio for a passport for himself and family. Marshal Radoglio replied that King Victor Emmanuel had instructed him that Ciano should remain at his post at the Holy See, where he would be safe. Asked why he had not told Mussolini how things were, Ciano answered that since he was no longer Foreign Minister he was no longer in a position easily to approach the head of the Government. Marshal de Bono, according to the Rome radio, declared to the court that he knew nothing about politics and did not grasp the significance of Count Grandi's order calling the last meeting of the Fascist Grand Council. De Bono also _ denied that he maintained contact with the King. Cianetti proclaimed that he was still a Fascist. He agreed with Count Grant's order because he thought such a move would shift responsibility for the war from the Duce to the King. ' • The Attorney-General exhorted the court to pass a sentence which would re-establish the morale and order broken bv the action of the Fascist Grand Council. MUSSOLINI POWERLESS. Reports from the Telegraph and Express correspondents on the frontier siy many influential persons intervened in an' attempt to save Ciano. Even the Germans are stated to have made representations. Ciano's wife (Edda Mussolini) and her children were . present in Verona during' the trial. She appoaled to Mussolini for a postponement of the trial, but Mussolini is reported to have replied that the matter was out of his hands.

It is reealjed that at the meeting of the Fascist Grand Council which turned out' Mussolini. Marshal de Bono pulled out a revolver and waved it at Mussolini. Ciano "did not take part in the discussion but was one of those who voted against Mussolini, who at. one part of the meeting pointed to Ciano and shouted: "From tho moment this man entered my house he betrayed ine!" As lie loft the meeting Ciano is reported to have commented: "He has at last gpt what lie deserved."

The so-called trial and its swift sequel add a fitting footnote to the demise of tho Fascist regime, says the Times editorially. "Tho Verona tribunal's death sentences were less an act of retribution than a display of revenge by an embittered and disappointed faction. Even so. it is mainlv German revenge. If personal malice had not moved the Germans to this act it had teen difficult to understand why Nazism at the moment should have chosen a narrot? field, wherein it might have honed for such support as the remnants of Fascism could give."