A former member of the Italian Red Brigades was arrested yesterday Thursday at his home in Buenos Aires, where he had fled and lived for the past 20 years, after the refugee status granted to him was revoked by the decision of the government of President Javier Millais, the Italian authorities announced and Argentina.

The 72-year-old Leonardo Bertulazzi was arrested “after the competent authorities of Argentina revoked the refugee status granted to him in 2004 by that state and submitted a new request for extradition”, the Italian police explained in a statement.

His arrest yesterday at his home was the result of “the work of the intelligence service” of the Argentine Ministry of Security and a “coordinated effort with the Italian authorities”, according to a statement from the ministry.

“Leonardo Bertulazzi was part of the gang that kidnapped and murdered former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro. Thanks to the joint work of the Federal Police and the Italian Police Envoy Office, with a deep intelligence investigation by the Ministry of Security, the DNIC, the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of the Interior, we caught him. The years of impunity for this dangerous criminal are over. In this Argentina led by President Miley, whoever commits a crime pays” wrote the Argentine Minister of Security to X.

Who is Leonardo Bertulazzi?

Against whom an international arrest warrant is pending for murder, assault and kidnapping, he belonged to the Genoese unit “March 28” of the Red Brigades when he kidnapped a shipowner.

He was sentenced in 1987 to a combined 27-year prison sentence for subversive activity and membership in an armed illegal organization.

He was arrested in 2002 in Buenos Aires (center photo) but was released a few months later.

The Red Brigades (Brigatte Rosse, BR), an organization founded in 1973 by Renato Curtso, inspired by Marxist-Leninist ideology, claimed responsibility for the murders, injuries and kidnappings of dozens of judges, politicians, journalists and industrialists in the 1970s.

According to the Argentine government, Leonardo Bertulazzi was connected, at least logistically, to the case of the “kidnapping of Aldo Moro” — the Christian Democrat former prime minister of Italy, who was kidnapped in March 1978 and found dead at the scene almost two months later of luggage from a car parked in the center of Rome.

Meloni welcomed the arrest

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who is politically related to Argentina’s far-right far-liberal President Millay, expressed her “deep gratitude to the Argentine authorities” for the arrest in a statement.

His arrest “reflects Argentina’s commitment to the principles of democracy and the rule of law and shows the world the firm decision not to live with unpunished murderers,” Argentina’s security ministry said.