INTRODUCTION

Thank you everyone, thank you for being here. After this day of meetings, it seemed right to take stock of our discussions.

We have just had a long meeting with President of the United States Joe Biden at the White House, during which we reaffirmed our solid alliance, strategic partnership and the deep friendship that unite the United States and Italy. We also recalled, I especially recalled (as indeed I did this morning with the representatives of Congress) the role of Italians, of Italian-Americans, in the development of this great democracy, which is something that is recognised by everyone.

Our country is much loved and looked upon with great affection, great attention and great respect by the United States; our bilateral ties are also rooted in this nation’s history, culture and identity, and in our economic cooperation which, as we talked about with President Biden, is extremely solid.
We talked about the excellent state of relations between our nations, our frequent contact and extremely fruitful coordination, especially at a time like the one we are currently experiencing.

As we were saying this morning, and I shall say again, it is when times get tough that you recognise who your friends are, that you recognise who your allies are. When Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine began, many bet, and probably the instigators of the aggression bet on the fact that the West would not have been so able to remain united. 

I believe that the unity the Atlantic alliance has instead shown has been a great message, as has our determination to defend international law, which is above all a way to defend the weakest, to defend the weakest against the risk of tomorrow having a world in which those with more military might can freely invade their neighbours. 

From this point of view, I want to say that Italy’s position regarding the Ukraine conflict is extremely respected, well regarded by the United States. The United States is also aware of the sacrifices and efforts being made by Italians and agree with us that everything needs to be shared, that responsibilities need to be shared, that consequences need to be shared. In this regard, I have found a lot of attention being paid to our position, a lot of attention being paid to our needs.

We therefore talked about how to continue ensuring our support for Ukraine and in the conflict, we talked about and stressed the excellent results achieved at the NATO Summit in Vilnius and, also here, the ability we had to reaffirm the cohesion, unity and comprehensive approach of the Atlantic pact.

We also discussed Italy’s upcoming presidency of the G7. There is a great deal of attention being paid to our G7 presidency next year, as well as high expectations and a lot of support, also with regard to the issues that we have already said we want to put at the heart of our G7 presidency: of course, there is the issue of support for Ukraine. I shall say it again: I would especially like to focus Italy’s G7 presidency on Ukraine’s reconstruction. As I have said in the past, we have already shown this by organising a conference on reconstruction which was a very important event that was attended by more than 600 of Italy’s leading companies and 150 of Ukraine’s leading companies. Talking about Ukraine’s reconstruction means betting on Ukraine’s victory, on a future for this nation that is one of freedom and well-being, a European future.

The issue of Ukraine will be at the centre of our presidency, as indeed will the other major issue Italy is focusing its attention on, and on which it is also focusing its discussions with allies: our relationship with countries in the Global South, especially our relationship with Africa, which is a fundamental piece on this ‘chessboard’ and in relation to which, in our view, Europe and the West in general have not devoted enough attention in the past.

I went over the work we are doing which, as you know, is very wide-ranging - the conference on development and migration we organised last Sunday, the agreement with Tunisia in relation to which, together with the European Union, we recently achieved a very important step, and my discussions with many African leaders. I was met with a great deal of attention and a lot of interest in and agreement with the fact we need to look more closely at development of the African continent and take a different approach to it.

I was also met with agreement and a willingness to cooperate with regard to our idea of a ‘Mattei Plan for Africa’, which goes with other initiatives that have been launched by President Biden himself. I am thinking of the so-called ‘PGII’ investment plan, for example. Understanding that a different way to cooperate with these countries inevitably has to be based on the ability to invest and have a relationship as equals, to demonstrate our readiness and good faith with countries that have huge untapped opportunities. I always say that Africa is not a poor continent; it is a continent rich in raw materials, strategic raw materials, metals and rare earths. For us, not taking into due account what is happening on this continent risks being a fatal mistake in the game of chess that is geopolitics, because you always need to be able to see the whole chessboard, and you need to know how to move looking at all the pieces. From this point of view, Africa is an extremely important part of that chessboard and I want to say that I am proud that this discussion, that the Italian Government began a few months ago at national and international level, is gradually making inroads among our allies. Our position is viewed with a great deal of respect, a lot of interest and substantial agreement.

We also talked about the UN Food Systems Summit that has just been held in Rome. The issue of food security is another particularly significant issue for our interests.
We spoke about China, about how we must guarantee our economic security, promote sustainable multilateralism and, at the same time, foster constructive dialogue with Beijing to encourage responsible behaviour. I made reference to the Conclusions of the European Council meeting at the end of June, a long section of which talked about this issue, with a view to close coordination between the European Union and United States to counter destabilising factors for the international system and to develop effective Euro-Atlantic action, for example regarding the issue of critical raw materials (an issue that we discussed extensively at the last G7 and that will also be on the agenda at the next G7), and the issue of supply chains.

Also in this regard, and I shan’t go into a line of reasoning I have explained many times before, but it is clear that something has not worked with globalisation based on free trade without rules. We believed that free trade without rules would have solved all our problems, like some sort of invisible hand, that it would have distributed wealth, that it would have democratised processes. Things have not turned out that way. Wealth has become ‘verticalised’, less democratic nations have not become more democratic but have rather gained ground in the world and we, instead, no longer having any control over anything strategic, have paradoxically found ourselves weaker.
Today, this issue that some have been raising for a number of years is now on our allies’ agenda and work is being done on the issue of supply chains.

As I was saying, we therefore spoke about China, the Indo-Pacific, our bilateral partnership. When the press were there, President Biden said that our bilateral partnership, our trade and economic flows, bring both nations great satisfaction, but there is no reason why we can’t do more. I agree with him; I believe there are many more things we can do together, that there are many areas where we can further strengthen our cooperation – I am thinking of energy, I am thinking of defence, I am thinking of infrastructure, I am thinking of space. I expressed my hope that our ongoing partnerships will be fully successful and that our companies, with their world-renowned know-how, that are particularly appreciated here, can develop further synergies with their American counterparts. Also in this regard, I found a great deal of openness and a lot of readiness.

In any case, as you will see, a very substantial Joint Statement has just been issued, offering further insights into this discussion. 
I would also like to take this opportunity to say, seeing as I have read some bizarre controversies about me allegedly refusing a joint press conference with the President of the United States, that as much as it keeps being said that I run away from the press, I would not have refused a joint press conference with the President of the United States, as you can well imagine. I would therefore avoid stirring up controversy about things that do not exist: this was never planned, it was never proposed and, as you can see, I have no need to run away from the press, considering that I am here now talking to you. I nevertheless wanted to say this to avoid yet more controversy being built up over nothing.

This morning, and I am coming to a close, we had two receptions with leaders of Congress: both with Senators and with members of the House of Representatives at an event organised by the Speaker of the House of Representatives. These meetings with Members of Congress were also very interesting and once again reaffirmed, allowing me to grasp, the amount of attention there is towards our nation, the fondness, love and respect there is for us.

The issues we discussed during these meetings were more or less the same, but I really want to tell you, and I shall now conclude, that I am proud to lead this nation, to lead Italy, a nation that is looked upon with great respect, to which great attention is paid, and that, I believe, is today viewed with even more attention thanks to its unwavering position, which allows it to play an important role also in Europe.

I am very happy about this and I wish to thank Italians for this, because I really believe it can build an important era for our politics, at both national and international level.

Overall I would say today went very well. I shall stop here and am ready to take your questions. 

[Courtesy translation]