A new government has been formed in Italy

As Euronews reports, a new government has finally been formed in Italy, after trying for weeks to put together the cabinet team, made up of ministers from the Five Star Movement and the League parties. The New York Times writes that Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte called his country’s new government “proudly populist and anti-establishment as he outlined a sweeping, if unspecific, vision for overhauling its migration system, renegotiating its relationship with Europe and moving closer to Russia.” Mr Conte assured Italians and international investors that Italy, a founding member of the European Union, would stay in its “home,” and that leaving euro was “never in discussion”, but also added that his government would support lifting sanctions on Russia, imposed after its incursion into Ukraine.

Later on, Reuters has reported that Italy’s new government plans to review the building of the final stage of a $40 billion international TAP gas pipeline. “Italy is at the end of the Southern Gas Corridor, a pipeline taking gas from central Asia to Western Europe. It is a cornerstone of the European Union’s energy security policy which aims to wean the bloc off Russian gas supplies.” As the inform agency writes, “a review would likely create tensions between Italy and the developers of the 4.5 billion euro ($5.3 billion) TAP project, which include British oil group BP, Italy’s Snam and Spain’s Enagás.”  The Southern Gas Corridor, which is mostly completed, snakes its way from Azerbaijan through Eastern Europe toward Italy. This development of events plays into the hands of the Kremlin.

Prepared by Marina Muradyan