Protesters in Collepardo, Italy, protest against Steve Bannon and his initiative to create a populist academy in the Trisulti monastery
© Giada Zampano
After a year of protests and parliamentary questions, the battle over the future of a medieval monastery in Italy has reached its endgame.
On Friday, the Italian ministry of culture announced that it is initiating proceedings to evict Steve Bannon, the former chief strategist for US President Donald Trump, and Benjamin Harnwell, a British conservative Catholic, from the Certosa di Trisulti, a Carthusian monastery built in 1204 at Collepardo, 75km south-east of Rome.
Last year, the duos Dignitatis Humanae Institute (DHI) secured a 19-year lease on the monastery, which is listed as a national monument. They say they intend to use the building to launch a school for nationalists where students will receive political instruction from Bannon and study other subjects such as history, philosophy and theology.
Former Trump adviser Steve Bannon leased the 13th-century monastery Certosa di Trisulti from the Italian Culture Ministry
© Pietro Scerrato
The legal papers finalising the lease were signed in January and Harnwell moved into the hilltop building which includes a cloister, library, 18th-century pharmacy and an elaborate topiary garden, shortly afterwards. But the Ministry of Culture now says that it has sufficient evidence of irregularities in DHIs lease application to revoke this contract and evict Harnwell and Bannon from the monastery. The decision was taken on advice from Italys Attorney General, the ministry said.
The move follows a report published in La Repubblica newspaper last month which alleged that a letter which was included as part of the DHIs lease application for the monastery was fake. The letter in question, purportedly from the Danish bank Jyske, vouched for the viability of the duos business plan for the building. But the bank manager told La Repubblica that “the letter is not genuine…it is fraudulent,” an allegation which Harnwell disputes.
The pharmacy in the Certosa di Trisulti monastery
© Mattis
Speaking on Friday after the decision to revoke the lease was announced, the Italian undersecretary for culture Gianluca Vacca said that other factors which were taken into consideration include the fact that the DHI does not list the “safeguarding, promotion and enhancement” of cultural sites in its statutory aims and does not have the necessary experience to run an important cultural site. “This has nothing to do with politics, we are interested in respect of the law and the safeguarding of our national cultural heritage,” he said, adding that the decision to award the monastery lease to Bannon and Harnwell was taken by the previous government.
Over the past year, villagers at Collepardo and nearby towns have staged marches protesting the monasterys takeover by Bannon and Harnwell and the culture minister, Alberto Bonisoli, has been questioned in parliament over the duos proposed nationalist school. In AprRead More – Source
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