Musk, Sunak Expected At Italian PM's Right-wing Gathering

Rome, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 14th Dec, 2023) Billionaire Elon Musk and British premier Rishi Sunak are set to attend a political festival organised by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's far-right party this weekend in Rome, the party confirmed on Wednesday.

Musk, who owns X, had in September backed Meloni's government in a row over Germany's funding of charities that rescue shipwrecked migrants in the Mediterranean.

Sunak and Meloni's relationship has bloomed over the past year. Both leaders have promised to tackle the large number of arrivals on their country's shores, penning a joint letter in October calling for tougher action from EU leaders on illegal migration.

Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama is also expected at the four-day Atreju festival in Rome, which opens on Thursday.

Meloni helped found the Atreju festival in 1998 when she was part of a far-right youth organisation, and it has since become an annual event for the political right, although it has also drawn centre-left politicians.

Former Donald Trump strategist Steve Bannon attended in 2018, as he sought to create a pan-European right-wing movement, and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban made an appearance the following year.

Back then, Meloni's party, which she helped found in 2012, was still a marginal force in Italian politics.

In September 2022 she stunned Italy's allies by coming top in general elections, in large part on a promise to end mass migration into the country.

She took office in October 2022 as the first woman to lead Italy, at the helm of a coalition including Matteo Salvini of the far-right League and former premier Silvio Berlusconi's right-wing Forza Italia party.

The guests this weekend also include Santiago Abascal, leader of Spain's far-right Vox party, according to the official programme.

Spain's Socialist party filed suit Wednesday against Abascal over comments suggesting Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez would meet a dictator's end and be strung up "by his feet".

Meloni is due to make a speech on Sunday at the festival, which was named after a character in fantasy novel and later film series "The NeverEnding Story".