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Italy recalled its ambassador to New Delhi yesterday for “urgent consultations” after India’s Supreme Court rejected the request by two Italian marines to stay at home during the period of Christmas holidays.
Italian Foreign Minister Paolo Gentiloni told parliamentarians this did not mean Italy wished to cut diplomatic ties with New Delhi, Xinhua reported.
The marines are accused of killing two Indian fishermen during an anti-piracy mission.
The soldiers say they fired on the fishermen after mistaking them for pirates while guarding an Italian oil tanker off the southern state of Kerala in 2012.
They had been living in the Italian embassy in the Indian capital while they waited to be tried, and were not supposed to leave the country.
But the Indian Supreme Court gave marine Massimiliano Latorre leave to spend four months at home after he suffered a cerebral ischaemia - a restricted blood supply that can lead to a stroke - in September.
On Tuesday it rejected Latorre’s request to extend his leave to undergo further treatment in January, and refused to allow his co-accused Salvatore Girone to return home to see his family for Christmas.
Pinotti said Latorrewas in no condition to travel. Italy was not defying India, but the recognition of Latorre’s health problems was simply “a calm and firm acknowledgement of the situation,” she added.
On Tuesday, Italian President Giorgio Napolitano and other politicians expressed unhappiness after the Indian court made the decision.
The marines were granted a home visit to vote in national elections last year, but India was furious when the Italian government initially said it would not send the men back.
A subsequent U-turn, which followed intense Indian diplomatic pressure, triggered the resignation of Italy’s then foreign minister.
Italy has been contesting India’s right to try the men in the courts since March.
It maintains that the pair should be tried on home soil since the shootings involved an Italian-flagged vessel in what Rome says were international waters.
But India insists the shooting took place in its waters.
In Brussels, the European Union’s new foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini has expressed her disappointment over the Supreme Court’s decision and warned that the issue could impact on EU-India relations.
“The decision to deny the plea of Massimiliano Latorre for an extension of his stay in Italy for medical treatment and to refuse Salvatore Girone permission to spend the Christmas period at home is disappointing, as a long awaited mutually agreed solution has not yet proved possible,” Mogherini, a former Italian foreign minister, said in a statement.
“The situation of these two European military personnel has been pending for almost three years now. The EU has consistently called for a mutually agreeable solution, in the interest of both Italy and India, based on international law. The issue has the potential to impact the overall European Union-India relations and has also a bearing on the global fight against piracy, to which the EU is strongly committed,” she said.
The EU will continue to follow closely the issue, is in touch with the Italian government and reiterates its call for a swift solution, the statement added.
