Stilettos. They hint at sensuality; they reek of power, they exude an erotic allure. Visions of Manolo Blahnik, Jimmy Choo and Christian Louboutin's extreme stilettos come to mind – embellished, bejeweled, exotic, colourful. They symbolize desire, they hint at fetishism, and conjure up health issues that would alarm orthopedic surgeons and podiatrists alike, from broken bones and mangled toes to blisters and crippling pain. Still they possess seductive potential: drag queen Lola in the musical "Kinky Boots" sings the anthem "Sex Is In The Heel", reminding us that high-heeled shoes can be conduits of erotic energy. And while you can't run while wearing stilettos, if you removed them, you could use them as weapons, as they are capable of inflicting harm when wielded.
Yes, stilettos and high heels symbolize many things, but they have never struck me as instruments of torture. While they torment the wearer's feet and inflict pain, they are not mandated by prisons as tools for punishing individuals. Surely, they are not a novel form of waterboarding. Or are they?
However, there's a mini-graphic novel entitled "In fondo al pozzo" (At the bottom of the well) by Italian cartoonist Zerocalcare (Michele Rech) where the protagonist, an Italian woman incarcerated in Hungary, is stripped of her possessions and ultimately, when summoned to appear in front of a judge, provided with dirty clothes and a pair of high-heeled boots. Peculiar, isn't it?
Except, this narrative is real. It's the harrowing reality of an Italian woman presently detained in Hungary, ensnared in what appears to be a miscarriage of justice. Her name is Ilaria Salis, and the boots they gave her weren't meant for walking out of prison.
Ilaria Salis, a 39-year-old anti-fascist activist and teacher from Monza, near Milan, was arrested along with some German anti-fascist militants in Budapest a year ago following a counter-demonstration against a neo-Nazi rally during the "Day of Honor" annual gathering (February 11th; neo-Nazis remember on this day the German and Hungarian forces that tried to break the Soviet blockade at Budinsky Castle but failed).
Salis was charged with three counts of attempted assault on two neo-Nazi militants and accused of being part of an extreme left-wing organization. She denies the charges, which could result in a sentence of up to 11 years, and claims she was forcibly removed by police while she was in a taxi. Furthermore, the two young men she allegedly assaulted never pressed charges and recovered within a few days.
However, the Hungarian justice system, which is under strong government control, deemed Salis a very dangerous criminal and kept her in a maximum-security facility in Budapest for months, with very poor hygienic conditions, and provided her trial records only in Hungarian. They reportedly did not even show her the evidence the prosecution claims to have.
In October last year, Salis wrote a letter denouncing the degrading conditions in which she was held in prison. Upon her arrival, she was not provided with any personal hygiene items and found herself without toilet paper, soap, and sanitary pads.
During the validation interrogation after the seizure of her clothes, as she recounts, she was "forced to wear dirty, damaged, and foul-smelling clothes provided to me at the police station, and to wear a pair of stiletto boots that were not my size." Until March 20th, 2023 (so for 5 weeks), when the prison finally authorized the Italian Consulate to visit her and deliver a package of goods, she remained without a change of clothes (including underwear) only with the damaged clothes and oversized stiletto boots that they had given her at the police station. Additionally, she couldn't have any contact with her family for more than six months.
In her letter, she wrote about small cells with insufficient ventilation, the contiguity of male and female cells, lack of fire escape exits, and only one hour of fresh air a day. Tormented by bed bug bites, which caused an allergic reaction, she wasn’t given any antihistamines or cream. The lack of fresh air following the monthly fumigation made her ill. She reported the presence of cockroaches in both the cells and corridors, as well as rats in the outdoor corridor.
In addition, she underwent a breast ultrasound examination in mid-June (even though she awaited for it since March) for a lump, but never received the written report, which has instead been delivered to the prison doctor, who refused to hand it over to her lawyer.
She asked to learn Hungarian but was denied it because she doesn't speak Hungarian (yes, I know that sounds preposterous...). When she appeared in front of a judge she was shackled like a criminal. In her letter she wrote: "In addition to handcuffs, they put a leather belt around you with a buckle to which they attach the handcuffs. Even the feet are tied together: around the ankles they put two leather ankle cuffs closed with two locks and connected to each other by a chain about 25 cm long. Then they put an additional handcuff on one wrist, to which a leather leash is attached, which is held in the hand of the escorting officer. All this equipment weighs a few kilos and the binding to the feet allows very short steps (...) Bound like this, I had to climb and descend several flights of stairs. You remain tied like this for the entire duration of the hearing."
Salis wasn't lying about the way she was shackled and this became clear a week ago when images of her hearing in Budapest were broadcast and showed her handcuffed and in shackles as she had described (but wearing sneakers at least...), flanked by riot police. Such treatment in Europe is not even reserved for confirmed criminals such as mafia bosses. As an interpreter, I sat in British courts multiple times next to defendants (mainly men) and they were never shackled nor restrained in any ways.
Basic human rights seem to have been forgotten in Salis' case that also sounds like a miscarriage of justice. Salis states she is innocent, and she was not afforded the opportunity to fully comprehend the case against her, as crucial documents, such as the August order extending her pretrial detention and the translation of the appeal to a second court, were not provided to her in Italian. It is as if, while she maintains her innocence, the Hungarian judiciary appears to be seeking a scapegoat for exemplary punishment.
Salis' story gained traction over the past two weeks: Italian magazine Internazionale published a graphic novel by Zerocalcare detailing her ordeal in mid-January, bringing her plight to the forefront. In his work the Italian cartoonist analyses her case, but also provides readers with some background on Hungary and neo-Nazi groups. As stated earlier on in this post, the situation escalated only when images arrived from Budapest depicting Salis handcuffed and shackled, escorted by riot police in court.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of the far-right wing party Fratelli d'Italia (Brothers of Italy) closely associated with Hungary's nationalist PM Viktor Orbán, faced pressure to intervene. During a meeting on unrelated matters, Orbán pledged to ensure Salis receives fair treatment, asserting the independence of Hungary's judiciary from the executive branch.
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani criticized Salis' treatment, suggesting alternative measures like house arrest instead of imprisonment. A statement from the Italian Foreign Ministry emphasized the need for dignified detention conditions, fair trial procedures, and translation of legal documents into Italian for Salis and her legal team.
While the European Commission refrains from commenting on individual cases, Salis' lawyers contemplate appealing to the European Court of Human Rights over Hungary's alleged violation of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, safeguarding individuals against inhumane or degrading treatment.
Yet in the last few days the case has turned into a political dispute, with Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini from the right-wing League party casting doubt on Salis' innocence and suggesting repercussions for her teaching career if found guilty.
Despite requests for assistance, Salis' defenders also encountered resistance, with concerns about setting precedents and diplomatic repercussions. The battle is becoming more complicated as Italian Justice Minister Carlo Nordio, maybe trying to please Meloni and Orbán, recently advised Salis' family against seeking the request of house arrest in Italy, citing the need to respect Hungary's judicial sovereignty.
Hungarian judges, citing the "risk of escape," previously denied three requests for the transfer of Ilaria Salis to house arrest in Italy. These requests were made by Salis' lawyers in June, September, and last November.
Salis' lawyer recently highlighted that the Hungarian defender working with them asked Italy to offer guarantees on house arrest in her home country, basically a statement to reiterate that the detainee at home would be monitored by an electronic bracelet and punctual police checks, as well as being physically taken to the Budapest court each time it was necessary.
In the meantime, the Hungarian government stood by its handling of Salis. Hungary's government spokesperson Zoltán Kovács stated on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter: "Sure, she was restrained in the courtroom, and yes, she had already spent 11 months detained. But 'inhumane'? Not really, no. Taken seriously due to the severity of the crime she's charged with? More likely.”
Hopefully, interest in her case will not wane in the next few months – Salis is due to stand trial on May 24th.
If you're anti-fascist, it becomes clear that Salis' imprisonment and treatment is more a punishment of her ideals than a punishment for what she allegedly did. If she's innocent, as she's stating, this is a miscarriage of justice against an anti-fascist.
Actually it looks like fascists and Nazis are free to roam around Europe, but anti-fascists aren't. In January hundreds of men made the fascist salute during an event in Rome outside the former headquarters of the Italian Social Movement, a neofascist party founded after the Second World War, during an annual gathering on Via Acca Larentia, commemorating the 46th anniversary of the killing of three militants from the now defunct party's youth wing. According to some media sources, among them there were also Hungarian neo-Nazis. Many people expressed their worry about this event, but the supreme Court of Cassation in Italy recently stated that fascist salutes are not criminally liable if they are made on the occasion of mere commemorations, but only if there is a real risk of restoring the Fascist party (that ruled Italy from 1922 to 1943). Which prompts us to wonder how do you distinguish a "mere commemoration" from a "tangible risk"?
This question brings back to mind the stiletto boots and open the grounds for more questions regarding them. Yes, I know this is not a story about high-heeled boots, they are after all a marginal element in a more serious case, a potential miscarriage of justice involving human rights.
But I can't take the boots out of my mind: why was Salis given high-heeled boots to appear in front of a judge. Was it completely random and casual, sort of "hey, we got these shoes left, just put them on." Or were they trying to give her a weapon to hurt somebody else (inmates? guards?) or even herself as they weren't even her size? Was the Hungarian prison system trying to launch a trend here? Anti-fascist demonic agent/dominatrix in jail? Was this a way to torment her, a way to turn high-heels from weapons of seduction and power into a psychological weapon of physical disablement? A way to add more pain and aggravation, turn the desire intrinsic in stilettos into degradation? Was it a message to tell her "See? You can't run or hide, you're vulnerable now." Or was it a performance, like the one in which Jewish Lucia had to sing dressed in Nazi regalia to an audience of leering SS officers in Liliana Cavani's "The Night Porter"? Go and figure it out.
Would Meloni - mother, Christian, woman (her mantra) and hobbit (well, she likes hobbits, so I'm not offending her here), the first woman to hold the position of Prime Minister in Italy (and to be able to prove that in Italy you can be a misogynist even if you're a woman...) be able to explain or maybe ask Orban to explain? Probably not.
Somewhere out there I can picture Zerocalcare in one of his drawings, talking to his armadillo conscience and telling him "I wrote a story about Ilaria, human rights, neo-Nazis and responsibilities, and here she's just talking about the boots?". Well, I apologise, but I tend to look at things through fashion-tinted glasses, after all fashion is a powerful medium. In fact, I think I may have found a new purpose for stiletto boots: in "These Boots Are Made For Walkin'" Nancy Sinatra sang about boots made for walking out on no good, cheating and lying men and on their hearts. Hopefully, one day Ilaria Salis' stiletto boots will boldly tread over Nazis and fascists.
Italian speakers can read Zerocalcare's mini-graphic novel on Ilaria Salis at this link on the Internazionale site.
Image credits on this post
Illustrations from "In fondo al pozzo" courtesy of Zerocalcare
Comments