The Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said Tuesday that he had been placed under judicial investigation after a government's decision to free a Libyan Police officer wanted by the International Criminal Court.
Osama Elmasry Njeem was released last week and flew home by an Italian state plane a few days after being arrested in the city of northern Turin under an arrest warrant of the CPI for alleged crimes against humanity.
The ICC has demanded an explanation, saying that it had not been consulted on the decision.
Meloni said in a message posted on social networks that they had put it under investigation for allegedly helping and inciting a crime and misuse of public funds.
She does not have the obligation to give up, and being put under investigation in Italy does not imply guilt, nor does it mean that formal charges necessarily continue.
“I will not be blackmail, I will not allow myself to be intimidated, so, so, let's say, I do not like those who do not want Italy to change and improve,” Meloni said in a video posted on his Facebook profile.
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Justice Minister Carlo Nordio, Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi, and the Undersecretary of the Cabinet for Intelligence Affairs, Alfredo Mantovano has also been put under investigation, Meloni said.
She said she believed that the investigation had been caused by Luigi Li Gotti, a lawyer who announced last week that she had filed a complaint about the release of Njeem and the use of an official plane to fly to Tripoli.
Meloni also said that the case was being directed by the same prosecutor who investigated the Vice Prime Minister Matteo Salvini in Sicily for allegedly kidnapping 100 migrants aboard a boat that had blocked at sea for almost three weeks in 2019.
Salvini was acquitted in that case last month.
