ROME- - Italian anti-Mafia author and human rights campaigner Roberto Saviano was on Thursday convicted of libel and fined 1,000 euros ($1,055) for calling Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni a "bastard" over her hardline views on immigration. The 44-year-old writer and his supporters had presented the case as a test of freedom of expression in a country where defamation can be punished with up to three years' imprisonment, even if it usually results in a fine. A Rome court found Saviano guilty and imposed the fine. The prosecution had asked for a 10,000-euro penalty. Meloni sued Saviano, calling him a "serial hater", when she was in opposition, in response to a 2020 TV interview in which he lambasted her and fellow right-wing leader Matteo Salvini for their attacks on migrant rescue-charity vessels. "All the bullshit (said about NGOs), sea taxis, cruises (for migrants)," he said. "All I can say is: bastards, how could you? Meloni, Salvini: bastards." Saviano spoke after seeing footage of a sea rescue by Spanish NGO Open Arms in which a six-month-old baby from Guinea died before he could be airlifted to Italy. Last year, Meloni told a newspaper she saw no reason to drop the charges - as she has been urged to by the PEN International writers' association - saying judges could decide "impartially" even in a case involving the prime minister. Saviano, who has lived under 24-hour police protection since his 2006 breakthrough book "Gomorrah", an expose on the Naples mafia that was adapted into a movie and a TV series, has a history of clashing with right-wing politicians. He is a defendant in another libel case brought against him by Salvini, involving a separate incident from the 2020 TV interview, while he won in May a civil defamation case against Culture Minister Gennaro Sangiuliano.
