"It's emotional to be here right now, because the last time I saw friendly faces was a year and a half ago, and back then there were Sara and Sandrone, who are now dead, and I couldn't express my solidarity with them because my isolation here is total; they forbid you from existing ."

Alfredo Cospito , an insurrectionist anarchist militant, held under the 41-bis regime in Sassari prison, testified via video link at the ongoing trial in Bologna against six anarchists. Cospito was called as a witness by the defense attorneys of the defendants, who are charged with various counts of damaging and disrupting a religious service for events dating back to 2022. These actions were committed in support of Cospito, who was on hunger strike at the time to protest the conditions of his "harsh prison."

Cospito was referring to the two anarchist militants who died in Rome last March (Alessandro Mercogliano and Sara Ardizzone) in the collapse of a farmhouse in the Acquedotti park: investigators believe the two were preparing a homemade explosive device.

In the Bologna courtroom, in addition to some of the defendants, there were numerous activists, who were repeatedly reprimanded by Judge Nicolina Polifroni for shouting phrases like "Great Alfredo!" and "Alfredo out of Article 41 bis." Cospito also greeted them by raising his arm. At the end of the testimony, the judge first expelled two anarchist activists from the courtroom and then proceeded with the hearing behind closed doors.

"In the 41-bis prison, there are people serving life sentences without parole who haven't seen a blade of grass for years. It's quite traumatic. Only now," Cospito said, answering questions from the defendants' lawyers, "to get here, I walked through corridors like those in the 'Green Mile'; the guards shout and don't let you see anyone . I went on hunger strike because there are people in here for 20 years who haven't seen a tree; the censorship is total; in my case, it means they don't let me read or speak. It took me two years to get a CD player. Recently, they blocked a book on the origins of Christianity." "I realized," he added, "that I was caught in an absurd system, in which people are used for political purposes, and that's why I started the hunger strike."