India settles to dilute case against Italian marines accused of killing two local fishermen

NEW DELHI: India won’t invoke a law that provides for compulsory death penalty to the guilty in the case against the Italian marines accused of killing two local fishermen, a top home ministry official said Friday, as New Delhi thrashed out a solution hoping that it would help save strained ties with Rome.

The official said the government has issued an order on Friday allowing the National Investigation Agency to prosecute the two marines under Section 3(1) (a) of the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against Safety of Maritime Navigation Act (SUA) that carries a maximum sentence of 10 years.

The NIA, which probed the shooting off the Kerala cost in 2012, had originally proposed to charge them under Section 3(1) (g) of SUA that says causing death would be punishable with death. The marines would, however, be charged under Section 302 of the IPC for murder, the official said. Under this, they could be sentenced to life imprisonment or, in the rarest of rare cases, death.

The marines, Massimiliano Latorre and Salvatore Girone, had claimed that they had shot at the fishermen mistaking them for pirates trying to attack Enrica Lexie, an Italian ship they were giving security to. According to Italy, the incident had happened in international waters and so its marines were not liable to be prosecuted in India.

The Italian government had also approached the Supreme Court asking it to drop the case against its marines because of the inordinate delay in the investigation.

They also wanted charges under the SUA Act to be dropped, citing an assurance given by the Indian government. The court last week gave the government one week to arrive at a solution in the case.

The government is likely to inform its decision to the Supreme Court on Monday, the official said. After the court told the government to find a solution, Attorney General GE Vahanvati held discussions with officials from various ministries as well as the NIA.

The law and foreign ministries had strongly opposed invoking the section that that provided only for the death penalty. Italy had also objected to application of this, saying it was not mentioned in the apex court order of last year that transferred the probe to the federal agency. However, the home ministry and the NIA had contended that dropping the SUA all together would divest the NIA of legal jurisdiction to probe the case.