Mattarella: Russia’s war in Ukraine ‘deplorable’

ANSA

ROME – President Sergio Mattarella condemned the war Russia has waged on its neighbor Ukraine, blasting it as “deplorable.”

“A deplorable war, which the Russian Federation waged after unacceptably claiming the right to aggression, every day leaves a trail of death, destruction and hatred that pollutes every field of civil activity and relations,” Mattarella said during an Oct. 10 meeting with recipients of the “knight of labor” honor. “Peace is urgent and necessary. The path to build it stems from a re-establishment of the truth, of international law, of the freedom of the Ukrainian people.”

The head of state said that Europe was “a target of this war.”

“The principles of civilization, the values affirmed as the response of the [European] peoples to the barbarism of the Second World War and the dictatorships that provoked it, have been challenged,” he said. “This is part of the reason why Europe is duty-bond to give a united, coherent response.”

Mattarella also called for a response at the EU-level to the energy-price crisis triggered by the war.

“The reasoning of the energy market seem to create obstacles, but the responsibility of the institutions is precisely that of removing them,” he said. “Only the European Union has the strength to do this, intervening in the price mechanisms, in the out-of-proportion increases, in the unacceptable speculation that harms citizens.”

Man arrested for slapping teacher who reprimanded daughter

ANSA

ROME – Recently a 34-year-old Italian man was arrested on suspicion of going to a high school in Bari and slapping a teacher who had reprimanded the man’s daughter.

Majorana Scientific High School was the scene of the alleged assault.

The teacher at the Puglia capital’s Majorana scientific high school had written a disciplinary note against the girl because she came to school in the second hour without permission.

The girl reportedly complained to her father who allegedly came to the school and allegedly attacked the teacher, police said.

The incident is one of an isolated string of cases of Italian parents attacking teachers because of disciplinary problems involving their children.

The father was arrested on charges of assault.