THE ASSOCIATION: ‘YET ANOTHER ATTACK TO TRY AND SHUT US UP‘
Rome, 18 November 2024 – Eni, through its head of the legal department Stefano Speroni, who is under investigation as part of the enquiry into illicit dossier-keeping and espionage, has denounced Antonio Tricarico of ReCommon in relation to statements he made during the RAI programme ‘Report’ on 5 May. He is now under investigation by the Rome Public Prosecutor’s Office on charges of alleged defamation of the company in the press. In the report by journalist Daniele Autieri last May, Tricarico highlighted the overlapping timing of the award to Eni of the mining license of the giant gas field of Zohr, off the Egyptian coast, and the dramatic event that saw the kidnapping, torturing and killing of university researcher Giulio Regeni by Cairo security forces.
An fact-based assertion, which, moreover, was amply supported in the second report broadcast by Report in the evening of 17 November, in which confidential Eni documents reiterated Tricarico’s assertion.
The accusation against the ReCommon exponent, therefore, appears to be yet another attempt to silence an uncomfortable voice, trying to deny what have emerged instead as unwelcome truths, in particular the events surrounding the Regeni case.
It is worth remembering that, last October, ReCommon, together with Greenpeace Italia, was sued by Eni before the Civil Court of Rome for waging ‘a campaign of hatred‘ against the company. The two organisations had rejected Eni’s judicial attack, branding it as an attempt to shift attention away from the Just Cause climate lawsuit they brought against the company in May 2023 and now pending before the United Civil Sections of the Court of Cassation.
Moreover, it should not be forgotten that in December 2021, again Eni had been the protagonist of an ‘act of preventive censorship’, when it had again ordered the programme ‘Report’ not to interview Antonio Tricarico in relation to the Nigeria-OPL245 affair because he and ReCommon could not be ‘worthy interlocutors‘ of the RAI public service.
“ReCommon expresses its solidarity with Antonio Tricarico and reiterates its firm intention to continue its communication and information campaigns on Italy’s leading fossil fuel multinational, exposing its responsibility in the ongoing climate crisis. Instead of trying to limit the freedom of expression of Italian civil society, Eni’s top management would do better to withdraw the complaint against Tricarico and instead carefully assess the actions of the company’s chief legal counsel (who signed the same criminal complaint against Tricarico) searched and investigated by the Milan Public Prosecutor’s Office as part of the notorious investigation into espionage and dossier-keeping through illegal access to public databases,’ ReCommon declared.
