The Globe and Mail: Italy invests new power in bloodlines

The Globe and MailItaly invests new power in bloodlines

As Italians prepare to vote this weekend in a national referendum on artificial insemination, it has begun to dawn on them that the controversial vote could be decided by a few thousand Canadians, some of whom have never set foot in Italy.

The referendum marks the first major test of a new law, designed to give full voting rights to all “Italians in the world” — that is, people descended from Italian immigrants, no matter how long ago they immigrated. The law, introduced in 2002 by Mirko Tremaglia, Italy's Minister of Italians Abroad, offers full Italian citizenship and voting rights to anyone descended from male Italian immigrants. Mr. Tremaglia has repeatedly declined requests from the foreign press to comment on the law.

That law, which will soon create deputies and senators in the Italian parliament, who are elected by people with Italian blood in foreign countries, has sparked a crisis in the Canadian government. Never before in modern history has a foreign nation tried to elect representatives on foreign soil. Italy has created a series of ridings where people not resident in Italy are supposed to stand for elected office and represent people who live in other countries. So you would have another government representing people on Canadian soil.

Under the scheme devised by Mr. Tremaglia, a 79-year-old member of Silvio Berlusconi's right-wing governing coalition, foreign voters will elect 12 deputies and six senators, who are presumably foreign-born citizens. They will represent four new ridings: North America, South America, Europe and the rest of the world.

Officials from the Canadian Foreign Affairs said that the law is considered a serious challenge to Canada's sovereignty, as well as a potential source of foreign conflicts on Canadian soil.