Actor Richard Gere will be heard as a witness in the Open Arms trial against Deputy Premier and Transport Minister Matteo Salvini on October 6, judicial sources said on Friday.
Salvini is on trial in Palermo for alleged abduction and refusal to perform official duties after preventing around 150 migrants and refugees on board a rescue ship operated by Spanish NGO Open Arms from disembarking as part of his closed-ports policy in August 2019, when he was interior minister.
Gere will be asked to give evidence in relation to the condition of the people on board the Open Arms.
The actor, who was on holiday in Italy at the time, rented a boat and went out to the ship on August 9, 2019 to assess the state of health of the rescued migrants and refugees and deliver food and water.
The Open Arms spent almost three weeks at sea after Salvini, who is leader of the right-wing League, refused to allow it to dock on the tiny Sicilian island of Lampedusa when he was interior minister in the first of two governments led by Giuseppe Conte, now leader of the populist opposition party Five Star Movement (M5S).
Salvini has said he acted to defend Italy’s borders and in accordance with a policy agreed with the rest of the government of the day. He has claimed that the trial is an act of political revenge.
Richard Gere best noted for his acting career, came to prominence with his role in the film American Gigolo, which established him as a leading man and a sex symbol. He is also known for his commitment to humanitarian activism and Buddhism. He traveled to Tibet in 1978, where he visited refugee camps. He later became a student of the exiled Dalai Lama.
He co-founded Heroes Project and is a spokesman for Meals On Wheels, for which his father has volunteered for 18 years. Gere has received important awards from the Harvard AIDS Institute, American Foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR), Amnesty International, and the Eleanor Roosevelt Humanitarian Award
