A-Infos (en) Italy, Umanita Nova #26-25 - Sowing Memory to Reap Freedom. A Place Called Pinelli (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

A signature collection has been launched in support of a request that 
will be submitted to the Municipality of Castelfiorentino (FI) by the 
F.A.I. to name a street, square, or garden after Pino Pinelli - either 
in the area of the former Montecatini complex (once it is renovated and 
returned for public use and leisure) or in the historic center of the 
city. ---- A LAND WITHOUT BORDERS... perhaps this was the greatest dream 
of Giuseppe "Pino" Pinelli, the anarchist railway worker who fought for 
a better world before becoming an innocent victim of a criminal 
conspiracy that took his life - along with the 17 victims of the 
terrorist massacre in Piazza Fontana on December 12, 1969, which plunged 
the entire country into mourning and despair. Born in Milan's 
working-class Porta Ticinese neighborhood on October 21, 1928, Pino was 
forced to leave school early to help support his family, but he never 
gave up reading and studying, remaining an attentive and curious 
self-taught learner. As a young man, he approached anarchist thought by 
reading the writings of Malatesta and Bakunin, and soon began his 
political activity by joining the Resistance as a young partisan courier 
in the anarchist "Franco" brigade. At just 15, he became one of the 
youngest partisans of the communist-anarchist "Bruzzi-Malatesta" 
brigade, active in Milan and the nearby valleys.

He emerged from the war with strengthened ideals of peace and 
brotherhood, which led him to study Esperanto - the universal language 
of peoples - where he met the young Licia Rognini, whom he would soon 
marry. Pino and Licia had two daughters, Silvia and Claudia. Pino won a 
competitive exam and was hired by the railway; in the years 1968-1969, a 
time of union and student unrest, he was active both as a railway worker 
and political activist in the USI and the Anarchist Circle.

The student, women's, and workers' movements took to the streets to 
demand rights denied by the state and governments. They fought for more 
rights for everyone, for the right to education and critical knowledge 
in universities, for shorter working hours, wage increases, and union 
rights in factories large and small. Starting in early 1969, waves of 
worker and student insubordination swept across the entire peninsula. 
This wave of protest became especially broad and uncontrollable in the 
industrial areas of central and northern Italy and spread to the south 
as well.

The press and system-aligned media immediately echoed the repressive 
message aimed at workers and students, with a clear call for a 
"presidentialism" against all anarchist and communist protest forces 
allegedly "inciting" students and workers against the government. The 
theme of "opposite extremisms" would for a long time become the rallying 
cry of Christian Democracy and of repression, launched by the message of 
President Saragat at a meeting of conservatives held in Florence against 
the protest movement that rejected "progress" and its cost: effort, 
labor, and pain. It was to stop all this that the bombs exploded, 
bathing Italy in blood, as part of the broader "strategy of tension."

On Friday, December 12, 1969, at 4:37 p.m., a high-powered bomb exploded 
inside the Banca Nazionale dell'Agricoltura in Piazza Fontana, Milan. 
Seventeen people were killed and more than 80 injured. The police 
immediately pointed to the anarchists as responsible for the massacre, 
and the newspapers echoed the accusation. Giuseppe Pinelli was also 
detained; he arrived at the police headquarters on Via Fatebenefratelli 
on his moped, following the police car. He died during the night between 
December 15 and 16, 1969, during an interrogation with at least five 
people present in the room, falling - or being thrown - from a 
fourth-floor window of the Milan police headquarters after being held 
beyond the legal limit.

There was never justice for his death; it was hastily filed away as a 
"suicide," covering up and protecting the true perpetrators of the 
massacre: the fascist terrorists who were only investigated many years 
later. Giuseppe Pinelli was innocent, as were the anarchists who spent 
years in prison under slanderous accusations, such as Pietro Valpreda 
and others. Today, thanks to investigations, counter-information that 
began immediately after the massacre, documents found by courageous 
lawyers, and the many trials held over Piazza Fontana - the "mother" of 
all subsequent massacres - we know (as we knew from the start) that the 
culprits were the neo-fascists of Ordine Nuovo, shielded and protected 
by officials from the Reserved Affairs Office of the Ministry of the 
Interior, who were even present at the Milan police headquarters the 
night they killed Pinelli by throwing him out the window.

We know that a "strategy of tension" was carried out in our country, 
with massive involvement of state apparatuses and the ruling Christian 
Democracy. A reactionary, coup-driven plan was implemented, consisting 
of increasingly massive and violent use of the police, the instrumental 
use of neo-fascist groups, the intervention of "separate bodies" (secret 
services), and the heavy use by the judiciary of the fascist-era Rocco 
Code - never repealed - to suppress the freedom of expression and 
association of the revolutionary left. Attacks were carried out to blame 
left-wing militants and organizations, creating a climate of tension 
aimed at violently repressing any kind of struggle or social conflict.

But the state's plan failed because true democrats, anti-fascists, and 
citizens - together with courageous journalists - understood the purpose 
of the "strategy of the bombs" and took to the streets to denounce the 
death of an innocent man: Pino Pinelli, who died in the hands of the 
state, entered the Milan police headquarters alive and came out dead.

Today, 56 years after his death, we do not forget Giuseppe Pinelli and, 
with him, the 158 innocent victims of the dark season of fascist 
bombings. For this reason, we ask the Municipality of Castelfiorentino 
and its Council to welcome and support this request to dedicate a 
street, square, or garden in Castelfiorentino - whether in the historic 
center or in the area of the former Montecatini complex - with the 
following inscription:

GIUSEPPE "PINO" PINELLI - partisan, railwayman, anarchist

Citizens who wish to support and share this project "A STREET FOR 
PINELLI" can sign the petition at the bookshop Libri & Persone on Via G. 
Garibaldi 17 in Castelfiorentino before it is submitted to the Municipality.

F.A.I. Castelfiorentino
Alessio Latini

https://umanitanova.org/seminare-memoria-per-raccogliere-liberta-un-luogo-chiamato-pinelli/
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