The Italian foreign minister and leader of the neo-fascist National Alliance party, Gianfranco Fini, rides in a carriage to Buckingham Palace. Photograph: Odd Andersen/AFP/Getty Images
The Queen shook the hand of a fascist today, and I don't mean Harry in full party dress.
The hand in question is that of Gianfranco Fini, Italy's foreign minister and the leader of the neo-fascist National Alliance party. Unite Against Fascism (UAF) today organised a picket of Fini's meeting with the Queen at Buckingham Palace, alongside a state visit of the Italian president. (You can print out this leaflet to commemorate the occasion.)
"At a time when the extreme right is making breakthroughs across Europe and the fascist British National party is attempting to make a national breakthrough in Britain, members of the monarchy should be distancing themselves from fascists," UAF contends.
Fini's National Alliance achieved success after the disgraced Christian Democrats were forced from their post-war dominance of Italian politics by successive corruption scandals. The DC collapsed under the weight of evidence compiled by the so-called Clean Hands (Mani Pulite), a team of Milan judges who investigated corruption at the party's highest levels. Investigations began in 1992 and within two years the party had disbanded.
Of late, Fini has been trying to rehabilitate his party, rowing back from his previous statement calling Benito Mussolini "the greatest statesman of the century". Fini would like to be seen as the acceptable face of Italian post-fascism (as opposed to Alessandra Mussolini, the great dictator's granddaughter, who stomped out of Fini's alliance when he seemed to be going soft on the fascism question).
However, events and protesters keep pulling that black shirt out of the closet. Fini's wife, Daniela, who accompanied him on his royal visit today, is among those endorsing a right-wing whip-round to pay the fine imposed on Serie A footballer Paolo Di Canio for giving the fascist straight-arm salute.
If nothing else, today's events prove that Harry is hopelessly out of touch with neo-Nazi style. As the UAF site points out: "Fascism in our time does not wear a black shirt but an Armani suit." Fortunately for the fascist on a budget, black is back for Giorgio this year.
