Radicalism is like a zoom

Prisons have always been a fertile ground for extremisms of any kind. Today, they top the list of sensitive places where Islamist radicalisation could thrive.

LISTEN TO THE WHOLE REPORT  ‘IL RADICALISMO È UNO ZOOM’ (BROADCAST BY SWISS ITALIAN RADIO – ITALIAN LANGUAGE -copyright RSI)

In Italy, according to the 2018 Report penned by Associazione Antigone -which monitors detention conditions- cases have grown by 72%. Such trend demands attention and should lead on the one hand, to questioning the reasons why; on the other, to examining which initiatives could be put in place with a view to prevention.

This in-depth, radio report discusses the issue with Fra’ Ignazio De Francesco, a monk with the Piccola Famiglia dell’Annunziata whose pilot project within a detention facility in Bologna (Italy) has become a documentary called ‘Dustur’ (which means ‘constitution’ in Arabic). The core of this educational programme is a robust interaction with the Italian and some of  North African constitutions. Such approach is particularly interesting as it lays bare conservative Muslims’ difficulties in accepting man-made laws.

The report also includes the testimony of Samad Bannaq, a young, former convict explaining the prison’s ecosystem which could lead to radicalisation; an interview with Valeria Collina, the mother of one of the London Bridge attackers of Italian-Moroccan origins, and the overall evaluation of the Italian case by Stefano Dambruoso, a well-known anti-terror magistrate and co-author of a draft law on countering violent extremism which also provides for a prevention plan, but remains to be adopted by the Senate.