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Speaker 1: Italy Time. Joe McKenna, very good morning to you.

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Speaker 2: Good morning mate.

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Speaker 1: Are you at the Vatican?

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Speaker 2: I'm at the Vatican waiting for the latest update on

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Speaker 2: Pote Francis. He's been in hospital now for almost three weeks.

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Speaker 1: Perhaps foolishly late last week said out loud that I

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Speaker 1: felt goodish about it all, given he seemed to have stabilized,

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Speaker 1: and then he had that upset over the weekend. But

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Speaker 1: he seems to have stabilized again. Is that fair?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what we've been hearing the last couple of days.

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Speaker 2: He's had four respiratory crises or incidents since he was

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Speaker 2: admitted to hospital on February fourteen. There's no sign of

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Speaker 2: him leaving hospital. They say that he's quite stable, but

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Speaker 2: those episodes of respiratory failure have certainly caused a lot

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Speaker 2: of concern and we just don't know if that's a deterioration.

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Speaker 2: Doesn't seem to be. It seems to be holding for now.

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Speaker 2: But it'll be interesting to get the update this evening.

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Speaker 1: Given the length of time this has gone on. What's

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Speaker 1: the level of interest in Italy has waned or is

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Speaker 1: it still as high as it was?

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Speaker 2: Look, I think there's a lot of interest in the

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Speaker 2: Pope's health, because in Italy the pope is like a

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Speaker 2: monarch really. Having said that, there's so much action going

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Speaker 2: on in Washington at the moment that seems to be

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Speaker 2: overtaking the news and the future of European armament as

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Speaker 2: well in relation to Ukraine.

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Speaker 1: You're speaking of all of that. So Vanderlyn comes out

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Speaker 1: with her it's Uro's eight hundred billions, so in our money,

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Speaker 1: it's about one and a half trullion dollars to sort

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Speaker 1: of buy some bombs and arms and get europesact together.

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Speaker 1: How does that sit with Maloney, Well.

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Speaker 2: She has been very supportive of the EU and NATO,

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Speaker 2: and she's coming under fire from some of her coalition partners,

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Speaker 2: notably the League leader, Deputy PM Matteo Selvini. He's raised

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Speaker 2: doubts about this proposal. Also tonight one of his colleagues,

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Speaker 2: John Colo Georgetti, who is the Italian finance minister. He's

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Speaker 2: also said that there is way too hasty and Italy

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Speaker 2: needs to think about it. It would cost Italy up

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Speaker 2: to fifty billion euros to be re arming and be

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Speaker 2: involved in this proposals.

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Speaker 1: That broad Italian discussion that you need to spend more

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Speaker 1: on defense individually as a country farliest part of the

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Speaker 1: EU is that going on at your place?

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Speaker 2: It sounds like it's more of we need to jump

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Speaker 2: on board with this European Union proposal.

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Speaker 1: Right, Okay, so Berlasconi, for example, used to hang out

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Speaker 1: with Putna, but they seem to be the buds when

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Speaker 1: you get to the right hand side of the Italian

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Speaker 1: political system. How many of them are on sort of

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Speaker 1: broadly speaking, Russia's side of this debate.

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Speaker 2: Well, certainly Matteo Salvini has been very pro Russian from

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Speaker 2: time to time, and it hasn't become clear where that's

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Speaker 2: come from and whether there has been some crossover in

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Speaker 2: terms of political financial support in the past, but he

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Speaker 2: certainly lines up more pro Russian than he does pro Zelenski,

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Speaker 2: and I think that's influence seeing his opposition to the

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Speaker 2: realm of mat as well.

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Speaker 1: Now on the economy, you got zero point seven percent, which,

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Speaker 1: speaking to you from a country that's been going backwards

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Speaker 1: for the last four or five years, that's not bad.

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Speaker 1: That was that well received or no one sees it?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that has been quite positive news for

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Speaker 2: the government because the Maloney government's been doing more to

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Speaker 2: recover tax revenues in the last couple of years, and

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Speaker 2: as we know, Georgia Maloney's popularity is still very high.

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Speaker 2: So these accounts are good news. I think there are

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Speaker 2: other signs though, of concern, particularly as we've talked about,

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Speaker 2: with the possibility of those US tariffs. There's news today

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Speaker 2: that if they go ahead, they're going to have a

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Speaker 2: huge impact on cheese, olive, oil and wine exports. So

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Speaker 2: we'll see what happens there, all.

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Speaker 1: Right, Stay in touch, Joke, nice to talk to you,

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Speaker 1: appreciate it very much. Joe McKenna, who is standing by

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Speaker 1: seven o'clock at our time at the Vagan.

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Speaker 2: For more from the Mic Asking Breakfast, listen live to

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