Among more than eighty-four dead in the massacre carried out last night in Nice, on the Promenade des Anglais, on the day of the national holiday of 14 July, in which at least ten children lost their lives (even among the dozens injured, some of them in critical condition, there are about fifty children), there are no only French citizens. Appeals to search for missing persons have been activated and multiplied on social networks (Facebook has also activated the Safety Check) of all nationalities, from Australia to the USA to Italy. Nice is notoriously a tourist destination (the second in France, after Paris) very popular with Italians, also given the geographical proximity: the Farnesina at the moment does not exclude victims.
ITALIAN VICTIMS - On the contrary, the rumors almost certainly speak of Italian victims: there would be at least four. The Farnesina does not confirm but at the Crisis Unit they say: "We cannot exclude the presence of Italians, given the extent and gravity of the phenomenon". At the moment, a couple from Turin and a Voghera are missing, while a young engineer from Foggia who lives in Nice for work has been found.
RENTI AND ALFANO - Il terrible attack obviously triggered immediate political reactions: the premier Matteo Renzi at lunchtime, he had not yet commented on the story either at the conference or on his Facebook profile, while on Twitter he retweeted the words of the French president Francois Hollande: "France is sad, afflicted, but it is strong and will always be stronger than the fanatics who want to strike it today".
From the Interior Ministry held a press conference minister Angelino Alfano, at the end of the meeting of the Counter-Terrorism Committee: “We have decided to further strengthen the systems of surveillance and control of sensitive targets. Reinforced controls at borders and airports: no one can rule out the unfortunate hypothesis of attacks in Italy”.
Here is what Renzi wrote about the usual e-news published on Facebook: “The images that come from Nice choke the words in the throat, block the fingers on the keyboard. Pain, emotion, solidarity. But also the desire to react because, as President Hollande said, "France is hit, but it is and will be stronger than the fanatics". Never like today we cling to our brothers across the Alps, affected right on the day of the National Holiday, July 14th. And the idea that the victims of these attacks are also children who were celebrating with their families makes the pain - if possible - even stronger.
For our part, in these hours all the structures in charge are at work. The Farnesina, with the Crisis Unit for our compatriots in Nice and their families on which we are carrying out the necessary checks. The Interior Ministry, which is working on both borders and internal planning. The intelligence services, meticulously doing their job. On Monday we will meet the majority and opposition group leaders to share with them - in respect of the roles - the state of the art.
But beyond the dutiful government initiatives, a sense of pain and anger remains when seeing the images arriving from France. From Nice we are used to receiving postcards of beauty, not the images of death with an abandoned doll next to a destroyed stroller. Reacting is a moral duty. Not leaving the French alone is the commitment of Italy and of the entire international community”.
THE KILLER – The murderer, who was killed in the attack, is Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, a Franco-Tunisian born in Sousse (Tunisia) but a long time resident in Nice and with French citizenship, 31 years old and some petty theft behind him. The identikit of the driver of the killer truck is therefore that of a common petty criminal, unknown to the intelligence services, "known to the police for conjugal violence and use of weapons, but no facts related to terrorism".
