by Cain Burdeau
January 31, 2023
Introduction:
Read more here: https://www.courthousenews.com/italy-g ... finement/(Courthouse News) — The fate of an imprisoned Italian anarchist vowing to die if necessary during a hunger strike to protest his country's harsh regime of solitary confinement has become the topic of heated debates and sparked a series of alleged anarchist attacks.
On Monday, Alfredo Cospito, 55, was moved from a maximum-security prison on the island of Sardinia to Milan's Opera prison due to his worsening health condition. He's refused food for the past 104 days and Italian authorities said he would receive better medical care in Milan.
His lawyer says he will not be force-fed in Milan and that his hunger strike will continue. He's been placed in a system of extreme solitary confinement designed to seal off mafia bosses from running their crime rings from inside prison walls.
By Tuesday, his case was the lead story in Italian newspapers and news shows. His protest is sparking political and public debates over whether Cospito should be seen as a political prisoner rather than a security threat who needs to be shut off from nearly all contact with the outside world.
Since going on hunger strike, Cospito has said he'd rather die than live the rest of his life locked away under Italy's harsh isolation system.