Italian Marine Latorre posts arrest video on Facebook

Bari (Italy), Feb 20 (IANS/AKI) Massimiliano Latorre, one of two Italian Marines facing trial in India for the killing of two fishermen, has posted a video on Facebook of his arrest four years ago, accompanied by the soundtrack of Italian rocker Vasco Rossi's smash hit "Give a sense to my life".

"This is what happened on 19 February 2012 when they took us to jail," Latorre wrote in a Facebook post on Friday accompanying the video.

The shooting in February 2012 of the fisherman by Latorre and his colleague Salvatore Girone off the coast of Kerala as they guarded an Italian oil tanker sparked a diplomatic row.

India's Supreme Court had earlier allowed Latorre to return home for medical treatment after he suffered a stroke in India, where he was detained since his arrest.

Girone has not been allowed to leave India and is staying at the Italian embassy in New Delhi.

A long delay and fears that the Marines could be executed if convicted of murder prompted Italy to take the case to international arbitration in June last year.

The Hamburg-based International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea ruled in August that India had no jurisdiction in the case and referred it to the International Court of Justice in The Hague.

The Hague tribunal last month said the arbitration verdict in the case would not come before August 2018. Meanwhile, Italy wants the two Marines to be allowed to stay in Italy until the verdict.

--IANS/AKI

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