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AFP
Rome
A ROWDY Italian Senate on Tuesday rejected a call by far-right leader Matteo Salvini for a swift no-confidence vote, deciding instead that Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte would address the crisis on August 20.
Interior Minister Salvini’s anti-migrant League had sought the vote after he pulled the plug on the coalition last week. But a majority of senators from former coalition partners Five Star Movement (M5S) and from the centre-left Democratic Party (PD) opposition rejected the motion.
Instead, lawmakers approved an M5S-PD motion calling for a debate next week during which Conte would address the Senate on the crisis.
Senators were recalled at the height of the holiday season after groupings in the chamber on Monday failed to agree on a timetable for the vote demanded by Salvini.
Salvini kicked off Tuesday’s debate with a stunning U-turn, offering to back a key parliamentary reform of the M5S which last week he said he could no longer work with.
In exchange, the anti-establishment M5S would back his call for swift elections despite Salvini’s anti-immigration League party withdrawing from the increasingly acrimonious alliance.
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14/08/2019
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