EU Officials Unnerved by the Strength of Italy’s Radical Right

ROME - Britain’s Brexit advocates drool at the idea of another European Union member opting to quit the bloc. And they hedge their bets whether it will be France, Italy or one of the so-called “awkward squad” of Central European countries so often at loggerheads with Brussels.

At first glance the prospect of another EU member quitting the bloc — of a Frexit or Italexit —strikes seasoned political observers as unlikely. But Brexiters aren’t the only ones who see a likely nasty clash emerging on the horizon between Brussels and Rome. Current opinion surveys have firebrand populist Matteo Salvini’s Lega party and the national-conservative Fratelli d’Italia consistently polling together around 40 to 42%, enough, with the backing of former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s more moderate but much diminished Forza Italia party, to form a governing coalition in the not-too-distant future. And that is unnerving EU officials.