Italian ex-militant extradited and jailed after decades on run

ROME: Former communist militant Cesare Battisti, wanted in Italy for four murders in the 1970s, arrived in Rome on Monday after an international police squad tracked him down and arrested him in Bolivia.

Jailed in 1979 for belonging to an armed revolutionary group outlawed in Italy, Battisti escaped from prison two years later, and has spent nearly four decades on the run. An Italian-flagged Falcon 900 plane carrying Battisti landed at Rome´s Ciampino airport on Monday morning. Battisti, who was not wearing handcuffs, smiled grimly as he was escorted off the plane by a dozen policemen.

He was expected to be taken to Rome´s Rebibbia jail, where according to media reports he will begin life behind bars with six months solitary confinement. Italy had repeatedly sought the extradition of the militant, who lived in Brazil for years under the protection of former leftist president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, himself now in prison for corruption. Battisti, 64, was seized late Saturday in the Bolivian city of Santa Cruz de la Sierra in an operation carried out by a joint team of Italian and Bolivian officers, Italian state police said.

Italy´s far-right Interior Minister Matteo Salvini and Justice Minister Alfonso Bonafede were at the airport for Battisti´s arrival. The fugitive could be seen walking casually about Santa Cruz in sunglasses and a blue T-shirt, in surveillance footage taken hours before his capture. He gave up without a struggle, according to Italian government sources. "We´ve got him. And now he´ll have to rot in jail. He´s a communist terrorist. A killer. A coward," Salvini said.

Battisti was sentenced to life imprisonment for having killed two Italian policemen, taking part in the murder of a butcher and helping plan the slaying of a jeweller who died in a shoo tout that left his teenage son in a wheelchair. "It´s over, now the victims can rest in peace," said Alberto Torregiani, the son of the slain jeweller. "It should have happened years ago."