The head of Italy’s industry lobby, Carlo Bonomi, traveled to Kyiv recently to demonstrate the business community’s support for Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression.
Even as he pledged to help rebuild the war-ravaged country, back home in Italy, Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s coalition was buffeted by a dispute over sending military aid for Ukraine.
Draghi’s government survived, but the turmoil in Rome showed how President Vladimir Putin’s invasion is exposing a fissure over attitudes to Russia that runs through Italian business, politics and society at large. With the war now in its fifth month and no end in sight, those tensions threaten to bubble up again and muddy Italy’s response, undermining European efforts to punish Moscow and to aid Kyiv.
