‘Uccisa in Nome della Verità’: Book on life and work of Daphne Caruana Galizia translated into Italian

Following the success and display of solidarity last November, when more than 20 friends, journalists, artists and academics came together to compile a book on the life and work of slain journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, the same team has now produced an Italian translation of the same book called Uccisa in Nome della Verità.

The translation is endowed with an open letter signed by famed Italian Mani Pulite magistrate and politician Antonio Di Pietro.

Contributors to the book include Former European Court of Human Rights Judge Giovanni Bonello, President of the European Federation of Journalists Mogens Blicher Bjerregård, former US Ambassador Douglas Kmiec and The Guardian journalists Jonathan Freedland and Luke Harding. They are joined by Maltese journalists, columnists and friends. The book also includes illustrations by prominent Maltese artists.

Caruana Galizia was Malta’s most prominent journalist, assassinated by a car bomb on 16 October 2017.

“This book offers a good snapshot of the issues surrounding the life, work and death of Daphne and should be of value to any person of good will who seeks understanding and improvement,” said the editor, Joseph Anthony Debono.

A number of journalists examine issues related to the current state of journalism and to Daphne’s contribution to it. In her field, she broke ground as a woman who shrugged off convention and dependence to forge her own rollercoaster ride through the profession.

Uccisa in nome della verità also includes contributions from women journalists in Malta who show the extent of her achievements, the challenges she faced and even problems facing the profession today.

Caruana Galizia’s stories took her readers into a Malta few people ever saw – an underworld of drugs, organised crime and corrupt government, writes The Shift News journalist Caroline Muscat, who is the book’s co-editor.

Muscat chronicles the vicious personal and physical attacks on Caruana Galizia, which increased in intensity over the years until the fatal attack on 16 October. Muscat argues that the Labour victory in June 2017 was meant to send a message: that despite the scandals which racked the government, this was the new normal, but “Daphne’s death will ensure that that will never be permissible”.

Between the late 1980s and 2017, Caruana Galizia made a name for herself for her electric tone of commentary, her shattering investigative stories and her will to leave no stone unturned.

This determination won her admiration and hatred in equal part, but unparalleled readership, in Malta and abroad. She fought for the cause of democracy, good governance and freedom of expression.

All contributors to this book gave their time and effort for free, and all profits for this book will go to Dar Merħba Bik, a charity chosen by Caruana Galizia’s family.

The book is edited by Joseph Anthony Debono and Caroline Muscat and translated into Italian by Paula Giannoni.