Gianfranco Fini

Gianfranco Fini (born January 3, 1952 in Bologna) is an Italian politician, currently Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister in the Government led by Silvio Berlusconi. Image File history File links Gianfranco_Fini. ... Image File history File links Gianfranco_Fini. ... January 3 is the 3rd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1952 (MCMLII) was a Leap year starting on Tuesday (link will take you to calendar). ... Bologna (pronounced , from Latin Bononia, Bulåggna in the local dialect) is the capital city of Emilia-Romagna in northern Italy, between the Po River and the Apennines. ... A politician is an individual involved in politics to the extent of holding or running for public office. ... Sir Robert Walpole, the first Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. ... A minister for foreign affairs, or foreign minister, is a cabinet minister who helps form the governmental foreign policy of a sovereign nation. ... (help· info) (born September 29, 1936) is an Italian politician, entrepreneur, media proprietor and the current Prime Minister of Italy. ...

Married, has one daughter. Degree in psychology, professional journalist from 1979.

He ran for mayor of Rome in 1993 but was defeated by Francesco Rutelli. He is the leader of the National Alliance (Alleanza Nazionale), a party issued from neofascism which has gradually embraced a more orthodox brand of conservatism. Worthy of note is its less than lukewarm defense of free-market economics and neoliberalism, in favor of a vision that embraces the participation of the state in the economy. A mayor (from the Latin māior, meaning larger,greater) is the politician who serves as chief executive official of some types of municipalities. ... City motto: Senatus Populusque Romanus – SPQR (The Senate and the People of Rome) Founded 21 April753 BC mythical, 1st millennium BC Region Latium Mayor Walter Veltroni (Left-Wing Democrats) Area  - City Proper  1285 km² Population  - City (2004)  - Metropolitan  - Density (city proper) 2,553,873 almost 4,300,000 1. ... 1993 (MCMXCIII) was a common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar and marked the Beginning of the International Decade to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination (1993-2003). ... Francesco Rutelli (Rome, June 14, 1954) is an Italian politician, formerly mayor of Rome. ... National Alliance (Italian: Alleanza Nazionale, often shortened to AN) is a right-wing Italian political party. ... The terms Neo-Nazism and Neo-Fascism refer to any social or political movement to revive Nazism or Fascism, respectively, and postdates the Second World War. ...

Early years

Gianfranco Fini in The Pentagon on April 27, 2004

National Secretary of Fronte della Gioventù ("Youth Front") in 1977, he was first elected Deputy on June 26, 1983. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (795x1500, 200 KB) Summary Gianfranco Fini, Italian foreign secretary, visiting the Pentagon on April 27, 2004. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (795x1500, 200 KB) Summary Gianfranco Fini, Italian foreign secretary, visiting the Pentagon on April 27, 2004. ... For the album by Ash, see 1977 (album). ... The Parliament of Italy (Italian: Parlamento Italiano) is the national parliament of Italy. ... June 26 is the 177th day of the year (178th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 188 days remaining. ... 1983 (MCMLXXXIII) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

From December 1987 to January 1990 he was National Secretary of MSI-DN, a far-right party. He held the post again from July 1991 on. The Italian Social Movement (Movimento Sociale Italiano) (MSI) was a neo-Fascist party formed in the post-World War II period by supporters of the executed dictator Benito Mussolini. ... 1991 (MCMXCI) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

He drew that party away from its neo-fascist ideology and more toward mainstream conservative right-wing parties in Italy. Some members left the party, but most remained, and in 1994, Fini merged his party with some conservative elements of the Christian Democrats to form the National Alliance. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Conservatism or political conservatism is any of several historically related political philosophies or political ideologies. ... In politics, right-wing, the political right, or simply the right, are terms which refer, with no particular precision, to the segment of the political spectrum in opposition to left-wing politics. ... 1994 (MCMXCIV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International year of the Family. ... Christian Democracy, (Democrazia Cristiana), the christian democratic party of Italy, commonly called the democristiani or DC, dominated government for nearly half a century until its demise amid a welter of corruption allegations in 1992-94. ... National Alliance (Italian: Alleanza Nazionale, often shortened to AN) is a right-wing Italian political party. ...

At the Congress of Fiuggi (25-29 January 1995) he was therefore elected President of National Alliance.

Coalition

Fini and his party have been part of Berlusconi's center-right House of Freedoms coalition which won the 1994 and 2001 parliamentary election, with Fini focusing on a campaign against illegal immigration. Fini became deputy prime minister in 2001 and foreign minister in November 2004. Casa delle Libertà, or House of Freedoms in English, is an Italian right of center party alliance led by national media tycoon Silvio Berlusconi. ... 1994 (MCMXCIV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International year of the Family. ... 2001: A Space Odyssey. ... 2001: A Space Odyssey. ... It has been designated the: International Year of Rice (by the United Nations) International Year to Commemorate the Struggle against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO) 2004 World Health Day topic was Road Safety (by World Health Organization) Year of the Monkey (by the Chinese calendar) See the world in...

From February of 2002 represents the Italian Government at the European Convention.

Controversial moves

Gianfranco Fini shakes hands with Ariel Sharon.

Although the National Alliance draws most of its electoral support from Italy's poor south, Gianfranco Fini is a native of the rich northern city of Bologna - itself, paradoxically, a traditional communist stronghold. Image File history File links Gianfranco_Fini_meets_Ariel_Sharon. ... Image File history File links Gianfranco_Fini_meets_Ariel_Sharon. ... For more detail of Sharons recent illness, see Illnesses of Ariel Sharon. ... Bologna (pronounced , from Latin Bononia, Bulåggna in the local dialect) is the capital city of Emilia-Romagna in northern Italy, between the Po River and the Apennines. ...

He remains the politician who in 1994 called Benito Mussolini "the greatest statesman of the twentieth century" and declared “Fascism has a tradition of honesty, correctness and good government”. Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (July 29, 1883 – April 28, 1945) led Italy from 1922 to 1943. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...

He was in Genoa during the 27th G-8 Summit and maintained close contact with the police and security forces. For at least some of this time, he was actually ensconced at police headquarters. Location within Italy Christopher Columbus monument in Piazza Aquaverde Genoa (Italian Genova, Genoese Zena, French Gênes, German Genua, Spanish Génova, Galician Xénova) is a city and a seaport in northern Italy, the capital of the Province of Genoa and of the region of Liguria. ... G8 work session; July 20-22, 2001. ...

Law No. 189 of 30 July 2002, known as the "Bossi-Fini law" after the names of the politicians who proposed it, amends the 1998 immigration law in Italy and introduces new clauses. New legislation to regulate immigration into Italy came into force in August 2002, and a decree on procedures for regularising the situation of illegal immigrants already in the country was adopted in September. The centre-right government's new immigration legislation has been criticised by both trade unions and employers' organisations.

During his first visit to Israel on 23-24 November 2003, heisowned fascism, claiming that it was an expression of “absolute evil”, and denounced the racist laws that were imposed under fascism, adding that many Italians had acted with "laziness, indifference, complicity and cowardice" in not opposing the anti-Jewish laws introduced in 1938 in imitation of Nazi Germany. He also claimed that he had changed his mind about Benito Mussolini. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (July 29, 1883 – April 28, 1945) led Italy from 1922 to 1943. ...

This led Mussolini's granddaughter, Alessandra, a longtime member of the MSI/AN, to leave the party (saying her family's honour had been abused) and found her own party, Libertà di Azione - Freedom for Action (later renamed Azione Sociale), which would ally itself with other neo-fascist parties in Alternativa Sociale. Alessandra Mussolini (born December 30, 1962) is an Italian fascist politician and Member of the European Parliament. ... Libertà di Azione is an Italian far right political party, led by Alessandra Mussolini as a splinter group form the Alleanza Nazionale. ... Alternativa Sociale (English language: Social Alternative) is an Italian political coalition of fascist parties. ...

However, Mr Fini can take comfort from an opinion poll, published last month, suggesting that his recent condemnation of fascism has the support of 70% of National Alliance supporters.

It is a further stage in the effort by Fini to detach the party, now part of the ruling government coalition, from its fascist heritage after the cosmetic changes that were decided in Fiuggi on 27 January 1995. Fini’s statements sparked controversy in his party, showing the fascist sympathies that persist within its ranks, despite its supposed evolution.

In the campaign for the referenda of June 2005, concerning the Italian law on artificial insemination techniques, considered by some the most restrictive in the world except for Costa Rica's, Fini surprisingly declared he would vote "Yes" to three of four referenda, splitting his own party, which is more aligned with the Catholic Church. A referendum (plural: referendums or referenda) or plebiscite is a direct vote in which an entire electorate is asked to either accept or reject a particular proposal. ... 2005 (MMV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Artificial insemination (AI) is when sperm is placed into a females ovarian follicle (intrafollicular), uterus (intrauterine), cervix (intracervical), or fallopian tubes (intratubal) using artificial means rather than by natural copulation. ... A church building (or simply church) is a building used in Christian worship. ...

On January, 29, 2006, after the approval by the Senate of the Fini-sponsored drug bill (equiparation of marijuana to class 1 drugs such as heroin or cocaine for dealers and fines for consumption) Fini, guest on the popular TV-Show Che tempo che fa, hosted by Fabio Fazio, admitted to having smoked marijuana while on vacation in Jamaica with a few friends, which in his words "made me sick for two days".

External links

• Italian government: official Gianfranco Fini biography
• Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs: official Gianfranco Fini biography
• BBC profile