Francesco Giunta

Francesco Giunta (21 March 1887 – 8 June 1971) was an Italian Fascist politician. A leading figure in the early years of fascism, he helped to build the movement in several regions of the country and was particularly active in Trieste. During the Second World War he became notorious for his role in occupied Yugoslavia.

Early career Born in the Tuscan town of San Piero a Sieve, into an upper-middle-class family of Sicilian origin , Giunta started his career as a lawyer, having studied law and philosophy at university. He served as a machine gun captain in World War I, having joined the army in 1915. Under the direction of D'Annunzio he became the propaganda chief in Fiume and a deputy for the city from 1921 to 1939. In July 1920, he led the squad that burned down the Narodni dom, the community centre of the Slovenes in Trieste. Giunta gained fame in March 1922 when he followed the example of D'Annunzio by staging a coup in the Free State of Fiume with 2000 followers. This laid the foundations for the official Italian takeover in 1924.

In October 1922, he commanded the Fascists from the Julian March in the March on Rome.

Under Mussolini's government He became national secretary of the National Fascist Party in succession to Michele Bianchi in 1923 and oversaw the move towards an increasingly diminished role for the party rank and file as Mussolini consolidated his government. He also sought to increase party discipline and was behind a brutal physical attack on Cesare Forni, a leading dissident within the Fascist movement.

Replaced by Roberto Farinacci the following year, Giunta settled into an undersecretary's role in the cabinet office. In this role he was pivotal in signalling one of the future intentions of Italian foreign policy when he stated in an April 1933 visit to Malta that he was on Italian soil and that the future of the island lay in complete union with Italy. He also acted as vice-president of the Chamber of Deputies from 1924. In this role, he was declared immune from prosecution in March 1925 when magistrates in Milan attempted to charge him over the attack on Forni.

He subsequently adhered to the new Italian Social Republic, Both Italy and the Allies rejected the demand.

The Florentine squadrist was placed under investigation in the 1947 Dumini trial, which investigated the murder of Giacomo Matteotti, after being implicated in one of Cesare Rossi’s memorial statements. He was not charged in relation to this but indicted on further, unrelated charges, the same year. Giunta settled in Rome, where he died in 1971.