A group of Venetian separatists who scaled St Mark's bell-tower in 1997 on Tuesday urged the Italian government to give them back the makeshift tank in which they stormed the Venice monument.
The self-styled Veneto Serenissimo Governo said they wanted their 'tanko' back as a symbol of their fight for a free Veneto.
The 'tanko', a haphazardly armour-clad truck which frightened Carabinieri into allowing the group to pass, is about to be auctioned off by the Italian state. The Governo said they refused to take part in the auction of such a talismanic object and demanded the 'tanko' back as evidence of the Italian government's willingness to re-discuss what they called a "rigged" referendum which joined the northeastern region to Italy in 1866.
In May 1997 eight members of the 'Serenissimi' group, some bearing hunting rifles, scaled the famed bell-tower and occupied it for several hours in a stunt designed to draw attention to their cause.
When Northern League MP Roberto Castelli became justice minister in 2001, he made it one of his first periorities to gain clemency for the group, some of whom had received sizeable jail sentences on the charge of armed insurrection. The Veneto Serenissimo Governo draws inspiration from Venice's long and glorious history as an independent republic known as La Serenissima.
