Good morning everyone, thank you to Chancellor Karl Nehammer.
I am very proud to be here today. I’ve discovered that approximately eight years have passed since a President of the Council of Ministers of Italy last visited Austria, which is hard to believe for two neighbouring nations that are so connected.
I am happy to have remedied this, just a month and a half after Chancellor Nehammer’s visit to Italy, confirming the strength of both our relationship as nations and also the personal relationship that the Chancellor and I have built over the last few months, through our common positions on many strategic issues, starting with the matter of migration. The Chancellor has already spoken about this; it was certainly also, and above all, thanks to our cooperation that the paradigm of the European Council, of Europe, changed somewhat with regard to dealing with the issue of illegal migration flows. Whereas, before, secondary movements were the main focus of debate, we have now together understood that the matter of secondary movements cannot be resolved in a serious manner unless the issue of primary movements is addressed first. Excellent work has been done regarding this change of paradigm, and now a further fundamental step must be concretely taken for the solutions needed to seriously address this matter. This will be discussed at the next European Council meeting, and we have spoken about this at length with the Chancellor, because we know we can both count on each other regarding the need for Europe to give serious and concrete signals.

There are indeed many other important European issues that we are closely discussing together. There is the upcoming economic governance reform, in relation to which Italy’s position is that the investments needed for the green transition and digital transition must be taken into consideration.

We have also discussed the Ukraine conflict this morning. Our position on this is very clear. We are obviously following developments regarding what has been happening over the last few hours: it is difficult to make assessments now, other than the awareness of a situation of chaos within the Russian Federation which clashes somewhat with certain propaganda we have seen in recent months.

Due to time reasons, the last subject I wish to address is the fact that there are also strong exchanges with Chancellor Nehammer, and therefore between Italy and Austria, on the matter of strategic autonomy. One of the major objectives the current Italian Government has set itself is to address the energy security issue, also through Italy’s ability to act as a bridge between countries that can produce energy, particularly in Africa and North Africa, also to respond to the issue of migration flows, and an energy supply problem, which is particularly marked in northern Europe. Our goal is to transform Italy into a sort of energy supply hub for Europe, and this clearly also means that Austria would automatically play a very important role in this scenario, in this strategy. We are working on connection infrastructure; I am thinking of the SoutH2 Corridor, so Italy, Austria and Germany. As you can see, there are also strategic choices for the future of Europe that involve us playing a key role together. I am particularly happy about this and I am sure that our relations will intensify further in the coming months and years. Thank you.

[Courtesy translation]