Independent Perspective News - Italy: Argentines who serve as soldiers for a year will get the citizenship

Argentine youths, men and women, of Italian parents or grandparents, will be able to join the army and after a year's serving as professional soldiers, with a salary around 1.000 euros, they will be granted the Italian citizenship.

The Chamber of Deputies yesterday approved a rule with the votes of the official and opposition parties. Now the Senate must pass it too, but the law is practically a fact.

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There is a treaty of double nationality between Italy and our country which allows people to hold both citizenships, but although the Italian government are continuously claiming their will to make it easy for those Argentines of peninsular origins to get Italian passports, the process is slower every day at consulates, and the Italian-Argentines cannot do it in Italy because they are requested a kind of residence permit too hard to get.

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"We have in mind the Italian-Argentine youths who are looking for a job in the harsh situation their families are going through", said Ignacio La Russa, general coordinator of the Alianza Nacional.

The Italian army is facing the problem of structural change: they must go from compulsory military service to a professional army, which requires much more complex training for peace missions and interventions abroad.

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Since January 2005 the Italian army will be integrated exclusively by volunteers, and there are difficulties to reach the number of 190 thousand professional soldiers. Today, there are 270 thousands, most of them conscripts of the compulsory military service. The reduction in 80 thousand soldiers would be compensated by the better training of professionals, who need much more time and stability to be prepared for the technological challenges and the new kinds of conflict the European armies will have to deal with in the future.

Today, a conscript soldier is paid 100 euros a month. With the new regulation, according to newspaper Corriere della Sera, voluntaries will probably earn about a thousand euros a month, which is twice as much what a professional soldier gains nowadays. The voluntaries' contracts are initially for three years and can be renewed until the retirement age.

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A deputy from Alianza Nacional, Filippo Ascierto, replied that the invitation is only for people of Italian descent. He added that "in the Argentina many youths with Italian parents or grandparents who emigrated sometimes love our country more than we do".

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The amend of Umberto Bossi's Liga also imposed that only half of assigned posts in fire brigades, the police and the military body of the Red Cross are assigned to those who have served one year in the voluntary military service. Argentine young men and women in the Italian army will thus be able request a pass to the public security forces, after getting their citizenship. But this has yet to be regulated.