Leftists Decry Italy’s Labor Proposals

Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators gathered Saturday to protest efforts by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to make it easier to fire workers. They also denounced the assassination of a government advisor on labor reform.

Union leaders claimed that at least 2 million people heeded their call for the rally in the Italian capital, but the number appeared to be far smaller. Rome’s police headquarters put the count at more than 700,000.

A sea of red caps, swirling red Communist flags and union banners could be seen on the boulevard lining the Tiber River near the demonstrators’ rallying point in Circus Maximus, the ancient Roman space for entertainment.

Before the rally began, heads were bowed for a minute of silence in respect for Marco Biagi, an economist and government consultant who was gunned down Tuesday in an attack claimed by an offshoot of the Red Brigades, a leftist group that terrorized Italy with assassinations in the 1970s and 1980s.

Organizers declared that the rally would denounce the killing as an assault on democracy. Biagi, through his role as a chief drafter of the legislation aimed at ending Italy’s system of virtual lifetime employment, was an opponent of the unions.

Many politicians from the center and left joined the rally, including former Prime Minister Massimo D’Alema, a leader of the Democratic Party of the Left, a former Communist party. “We’re here to say no to terrorism,” D’Alema said.

The leader of the Communist-backed CGIL labor confederation, Sergio Cofferati, told the crowd that the killing was carried out just when “workers and citizens were mobilizing to claim their legitimate rights.”

Berlusconi, in a message broadcast Friday on state TV and the media magnate’s private TV networks, reiterated his government’s resolve to push the employment reform through Parliament. Opposition politicians immediately accused Berlusconi of taking advantage of Biagi’s slaying to push his agenda, noting that the televised appeal came on the eve of the protest.

Agriculture Minister Giovanni Alemanno said the big turnout didn’t ease the government’s resolve to reform the labor laws. However, he expressed concern about the prospect of a general strike in April.

Berlusconi has invited unions to talks about the reform Tuesday, but given that both sides have declared that they won’t budge, it is unclear what might come out of the meeting.

The drive to change labor laws has split the country, and Italy’s main labor confederations are calling for a general strike in April to protest the reform.

When Berlusconi first became prime minister in 1994, he backed off on pension reform after mass protests by workers in the streets. His government collapsed that year after eight months in office.

“The government will soon realize that they are losing ground and they will lose power as it happened in 1994,” said factory worker Salvatore Picco, 35, who was carrying his furled Communist flag after the rally as he walked to a bus to travel back to Turin, several hundred miles to the north.