Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni condemned the recent protests against the Olympic Games in Milan and the alleged sabotage of railway infrastructure, calling those responsible “enemies of Italy and Italians” in the early hours of Sunday.
She wrote on her social network: “The protesters are protesting ‘against the Olympics’, causing these images to be shown on televisions around the world. After others cut the railway cables to prevent the trains from leaving,” said Meloni, adding that thousands of Italians, including many volunteers, are working to make the Games run smoothly. “Once again, solidarity with the police, the city of Milan and all those who will see their work undermined by these criminal gangs.”
Italy’s Transport Ministry said it had opened a terrorism investigation into the synchronized sabotage of railway lines in northern Italy on Saturday, the first day of the Games.
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No one claimed responsibility for the attack, Italian news agency ANSA reported.
The alleged sabotage first hit the Bologna distribution center, which controls rail traffic between northern and southern Italy, at around 6am on Saturday, when it was still dark, ANSA said. It then hit trains in the Pesaro region, along the Adriatic coast.
According to the news agency, in both cases, the infrastructure was set on fire or cut to provoke sabotage. Thousands of passengers were affected by delays that lasted hours.
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In Milan, Italian police fired tear gas and water cannons on Saturday night at dozens of protesters who were throwing fireworks and trying to access a highway near one of the Winter Olympics venues.
The brief confrontation occurred at the end of a peaceful march by thousands of people against the environmental impact of the Games and the presence of American agents in Italy.
The clash comes days after Meloni’s government approved a security decree that allows police to detain people for up to 12 hours when there are reasonable grounds to believe they may act as agitators and disrupt peaceful protests. Opposition parliamentarians criticized the measure, considering it an attack on freedom of expression.
Peaceful protest is legitimate, but “we draw the line when it comes to violence,” said International Olympic Committee spokesman Mark Adams during a press conference on Sunday. “This has no place in the Olympic Games.”
Police held back violent protesters, who were apparently trying to reach the ice hockey rink at the Santagiulia Olympic Complex, following the clash. By then, the peaceful protest, which included families with young children and students, had dispersed.
Protesters carried cardboard cutouts representing the trees felled to build the new bobsled track in Cortina. A group of dancers performed to the sound of drums. Music played loudly from a truck leading the march, including an expletive-filled anthem against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
