The European Parliament’s Legal Affairs Committee (JURI) voted Tuesday against lifting the immunity of left-wing Italian MEP Ilaria Salis, arguing that she would not get a fair trial in Viktor Orbán’s Hungary.
Salis, 41, was arrested in February 2023 in Budapest, charged with attempted assault on a far-right activist and accused of belonging to an extreme left-wing group. She spent more than a year in jail in Hungary before being elected to the Parliament with Italy’s Greens and Left Alliance.
The detention of Salis — who sits with The Left group in Parliament — sparked outrage after images of her in shackles went viral. Her father, Roberto Salis, denounced the conditions in which she was held as “inhumane,” while critics accused the Hungarian government of weaponizing the judiciary to intimidate anti-fascists.