Amnesty presses Italy on Covid probe as parliament stalls

Italy should urgently launch a public inquiry into its handling of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Amnesty International rights group said yesterday, as lawmakers in Rome dithered over the issue.

One of the first countries to be hit by the pandemic, Italy has registered over 131,000 deaths since the first domestic cases were spotted in the north in February 2020.

"It is vital that the Italian parliament approves an independent inquiry so that lessons can be learned, similar mistakes can be prevented and justice can be provided to those people who died unnecessarily and those who were wrongly dismissed," said Debora Del Pistoia, researcher at Amnesty International Italy.

Her remarks came as Amnesty released a report claiming  staff in Italian hospitals and care homes who raised concerns about their working conditions during the pandemic were silenced or punished.