Italy to honour slain anti-Mafia judges with new €2 coin

Rome: Italy is to pay homage to the anti-Mafia judges Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino by issuing a new €2 coin in 2022, on the 30th anniversary of their murders.

The commemorative coin has been designed by Valerio De Seta, based on Tony Gentile’s famous photograph of the two judges who were close friends and were killed within months of each other.

Italy will mint a total of three million coins which will have legal tender status and will come into general circulation on 2 January, according to the ministry of economy and finance.

Falcone and Borsellino spent most of their distinguished professional careers as judges and prosecuting magistrates trying to overthrow the power of the Sicilian Mafia.

Falcone was assassinated by the Corleonesi Mafia in a bombing on the A29 motorway near the town of Capaci, on 23 May 1992. Falcone’s wife and three police officers were also killed in the blast.

Borsellino was killed by a car bomb in Palermo, along with five police officers, on 19 July 1992.

The men’s deaths, just 57 days apart, resulted in a huge outpouring of public grief as well as a major crackdown against the Sicilian Mafia, leading to the arrest of Cosa Nostra boss Totò Riina who died in jail in 2017.