Secretary Antony J. Blinken and Italian Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani at the Signing of a Memorandum of Understanding to Expand Collaboration on[...]

SECRETARY BLINKEN: Let me just say I think - to our colleagues here, first, we are so grateful to have what I believe is the closest partnership we've ever had between the United States and Italy where we're working together on all of the most critical issues of our time, whether it's helping Ukraine defend itself against Russian aggression, dealing with the challenges of conflict in the Middle East, having a shared approach to some of the challenges posed by China, working together to address the needs and aspirations of people in the global majority countries. All of this and so many more things bring us together, and Italy's leadership - whether it's the G7 or on all of these issues - is what's making a real difference. We're grateful for that. President Biden deeply appreciates his partnership with Prime Minister Meloni, and we appreciate our partnership with Italy.

This memorandum of understanding that we just signed goes to one of the critical challenges that our countries and other democracies are facing, which is the increasing use of misinformation and disinformation to try to destabilize our democracies. By working more closely together, Italy and the United States can more effectively deal with this challenge. That's what this MOU is all about.

FOREIGN MINISTER TAJANI: (Via translation) We are pleased that we have signed with the United States this memorandum to combat disinformation. There are non-democratic countries that use fake news to create confusion within democratic countries such as the United States, Italy, and inside the EU, and also to influence elections. Now Italy like the whole European Union is preparing to vote for the renewal of the European Parliament. We do not want any conditioning of our citizens through fake news, using social media or even AI, to influence their vote.

Democracy is valuable; we want to defend it. We want our citizens to be free, and this memorandum is a memorandum that defends the freedom of opinion. We do not want our citizens to be conditioned by fake news and for their vote to be distorted because it is influenced by baseless news.

It is a shared obligation, because great democracies like the United States and Italy have the right and the duty to defend the freedom of their citizens. This is most of all a battle for freedom, and when you are not free to decide, your freedom falls apart. It is an attack on democracy and that is what our adversaries want.

We face a confrontation between democracies and autocracies. Autocracies do not need to call elections and influence their citizens because they impose the truth of their regime. We are free, and we want every citizen to form their own opinion. Citizens should form their opinions through objective facts, not because they arrive at opinions through fake news in social media that pushes them to make choices that they would never make. Thus the importance to work together, to exchange information among democratic states.

I repeated this today. For us, the transatlantic relationship is the polar star of our foreign policy, like the relationship with European Union. We want to continue to work with the United States as well in such an important sector. We are defending the founding principles of the G7, NATO, and the transatlantic relationship.

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