ITALY'S 'KREMLIN ROCK'
Maranz, George
Italy's 'Kremlin Rock' Quaint San Marino Now Run by Quainter 'Communists By GEORGE MARINO BAM MARINO A BOUT seventeen hundred years ago a Dalmatian stone-cutter named Marino escaped the...
...For over fifty years he has been a member of the 'Socialist party and out of these fifty years he was exiled for twenty...
...The "Bolsheviks" have reduced the share of the owners to 42% and allow the peasants to keep 58...
...162 women, men and children were killed and a damage of 732,000,000 liras was caused...
...Italy's 'Kremlin Rock' Quaint San Marino Now Run by Quainter 'Communists By GEORGE MARINO BAM MARINO A BOUT seventeen hundred years ago a Dalmatian stone-cutter named Marino escaped the Roman's pagan police and took refuge or Mount Titanus...
...Well, the Government of San Marino allowed them to build a Casino on the rock and a few hotels to lodge the gamblers...
...It has remained suspended ever since...
...It was there that the brothers Malio and Juliano were in Jail till a recent amnesty enabled them to be released.y No other citizen of San Marino has been imprisoned for his political convictions ever since...
...of San Marino tor the last sixteen hundred years...
...Paris is more my home than San Marino...
...A Republic would come on the market and be bought at a cheap price...
...The situation was quite dramatic as the Church hat given its benediction to the Presidents...
...In 1797 he even offered a large chunk of territory to San Marino, offering to make a powerful state out of it...
...So why should we break up a union of purpose which enables us to work for progress...
...Every Government in the world needs money...
...They are being asked to believe that since the times of Lincoln who was made an honorary citizen of San Marino and who wrote in reply that "although your dominion is small, your State is nevertheless one of the most honoured in all history," the small Republic is one of Uncle Sam's most favourite nephews...
...Russia doesn't care for us and we don't care for the . Russians...
...Now, as then, the sixty members of the Council appoint two presidents every six months...
...I am not(" he said, "for the simple reason thai we have only one Socialist party in San Marino and it was never split...
...How I can work with the Socialists...
...Why shouldn't I if nothing separates us...
...I am a militant Communist," Signor Lino Celli, the Minister of Agriculture told me...
...A few weeks more and San Marino would go bankrupt...
...The Republic has been asking for five years for compensation...
...Tor Mussolini, however, San Marino was not too small...
...They net 500,000 Liras daily and they hope that this ataount will be increased to 1,000,000 Liras daily very shortly...
...But when San Marino became liberated I returned to the Rock at once...
...We aren't beggars,'' Signor Celli told me...
...them—and 13,000 of havenot's...
...The Govern ment asked whether the ceremony will take place as usual "Of course," was the reply from Rome...
...The big great world does not interest us...
...As a person, it is true, Signor Vincencio Pedini has been excommunicated, but as n President of San Marino he was not...
...Yes, Uncle Sam loves his little nephew but Uncle Marshall didn't give him a nickel yet . . . Now "the Bolsheviks" of San Marino had one hope left...
...They have been getting polite letters ever since...
...Each of the two presidents has half a power, but neither can keep his halved power for longer than six months: Only after having been out of office for three years, can he be reelected...
...In 1932 the line was completed but during the war it was suspended...
...DURING THE SHORT PERIOD of time which had elapsed between the liberation and the new elections, many citizens of San Marino streamed back to their homes after an exile of over twenty years...
...Both of them were leading fascists...
...One of them is a Communist and as such, was excommunicated by the Church...
...After the liberation the Court of San Marino sentenced Juliano to seven years and Malio to five...
...On this question there was never a difference of views between us and our Communists...
...Once he came to power, he persuaded a majority of the Council members to join the Fascist Party, suppress the other parties, and to strangle the freedom which had been San Marino's hallmark for sixteen hundred years...
...I had left It only once, when I went to fight in Spain...
...Bishops and kings, tyrants and dictators fought this rock of freedom for many centuries, but somehow San Marino managed to survive...
...Direct taxation was far too negligible to allow the state,to exist, but as Italy supplies the small Republic with tabacco and most other products on which no customs of any kind are being taken, the Italian Government has to pay 90,000,000 Liras every year to the Republic...
...There I lost one eye and I had to return to France...
...For twenty years San Marino was enslaved: dozens of citizens fled, others were exiled, many were imprisoned...
...An agricultural co-operative does tremendous business and productive co-operatives are being assisted by the government with all possible means...
...Their case is being considered with great favour...
...They got forty seats out of sixty—the Drama of San Marino could begin . . . Signer Gino Jaconini is 71 years old...
...The British liberated San Marino on September 20, 1944 but respected the old tradition and withdrew their troops after a few days...
...The 13,000 citizens of San Marino do not have to worry any longer about paying doctor's bills...
...They have seen their Government at work for the last four years and they returned it for a second term...
...WHAT DREADFUL CRIMES did "the Kremlin of the West" commit for which it has to pay now at the rate of many million lira* every year...
...He liked the beautiful mountain, and so did a lot of his Christian friends who followed him there...
...They have heard that there is a Socialist Government in Britain...
...Kremlin" of the West has no prison of its own but in accord* nnce with an old treaty existing between Italy and San Marino the criminals of San Marino serve their sentences in the neighbouring Italian prison of Urbino...
...The Government does it for them...
...So great is the danger that a whole fleet of planes was dropping leaflets in their millions on the rock prior to the last elections on February 27, 1949...
...But here, right here on our rock we have some haves—very few of George Marans Is a European Journalist who contributes frequently to 7Vi<» !\'rw htairr...
...Prior to the present regime of terror on the rock the peasants working on their lands had to give them half the harvest...
...It owes now 260,000,000 and it shows no intention whatsoever to pay a penny on account Tourists form another source of income...
...Surely it wasn't very much of a crime for the "Bolshevik" Government of San Marino to help establish the first few Oo-ops on the rock...
...But the people of San Marino could not be converted by some leaflets...
...They have nineteen seats on the Council and we have thirteen...
...The landowners have been robbed, and dispossessed...
...Even Napoleon thought it wiser to respect the smallest and oldest republic in the world...
...But I have very little time to think of Russia and they have even less...
...On October 1, the two new Presidents were installed in power...
...Just a further indication that "Bolshevism" is on the march...
...They are now doing the same...
...Yes, I have been a militant Communist since I was a boy...
...1 grew, up in France where my father was living in exile...
...I suppose you are a member of the pro-Communist Nenni party," I asked him right at the beginning ef our talk...
...A Socialist party and a Communist party were established...
...He smiled...
...I learned that the brothers Malio and Juliano Gozi are already out of prison...
...Isn't it dreadful...
...If not for a few damned capitalists this would be the case, but these particular capitalists have the obliging quality of helping the "Bolsheviks" if the Bolsheviks promise them some profit...
...We have done a bit for them since we are in power...
...Now the "Bolsheviks" are getting on without Uncle Sam's help and without Uncle Marshall's aid...
...In 1996 the Fascists of San Marino and the Fascists of Italy signed an agreement due to which Italy got the right to build and to exploit an electric railway line between Rimini and San Marino which was to become the property of San Marino in 1957...
...Yes, almost horrifying crime has been committed...
...Together with a few Republicans they formed the Front of Freedom and Candida ted with a single list...
...Yes, I believe in Russia and they don't...
...Now there is a co-op shop in every village...
...The two presidents said they appreciated Bonaparte's interest, but "small they were and small they wanted to remain...
...We have our views on Russia and the Communists have theirs, but Russia is far away and San Marino is very small...
...Persist with your questioning and finally the truth comes out...
...They have established a little Kremlin on the rock," a Christian Democrat who wished to remain unknown has told me...
...The Government would resign...
...Although it took eight centuries for the little Christian republic to work out a constitution based on equal rights, since the twelfth century its laws have remained the same Today the 13,000 citizens of San Marino elect the sixty members of their state Council in the same way as they did eight hundred years ago...
...I asked him how many citizens of San Marino are being kept imprisoned by "the Kremlin...
...We shall take either what is due to us or we shan't take a penny...
...In their despair the "Bolsheviks" of San Marino have asked for Marshall aid...
...THE CHRISTIAN DEMOCRATS were triumphing...
...Surely this Socialist Government would not do them wrong During the war the RAF violated the neutrality of the Republic and bombed it heavily...
...Our job is here and we intend to do it as well as we only can...
...At first they were very weak .and the citizens of San Marino did not quite grasp this innovation...
...Now he is the Foreign Secretary of the tiny Republic on the rock...
...The "Bolsheviks" of San Marino don't like Bevin but they are filled with admiration for Bevan's work...
...A few days ago the British Government offered them 60,000,000 Lirqs...
...The Government of San Marino had one single source of important income...
Vol. 33 • January 1950 • No. 1
