An online petition calling for an independent inquiry into the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia has so far raised just shy of 34,000 signatures.

The petition, on change.org, was started by veteran Italian journalist Sandro Ruotolo and anti-mafia journalist Paolo Borrometi. Both journalists live under armed guard because of threats on their life by organised crime.

The petition recalls the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly’s resolution demanding Malta launches an independent and impartial inquiry into the assassination in conformity with the requirements of the European Convention on Human Rights.

“The international community cannot look away,” the petition says. “Truth and justice for Daphne Caruana Galizia”.

The petition continues to gain traction in spite of remarks by Malta’s Foreign Minister Carmelo Abela who last week assured participants in a London conference on media freedom, Malta would comply with a three month deadline to launch an inquiry set by the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly.

However that statement was put in doubt again after the Prime Minister’s office insisted their position that the government is advised not to launch an inquiry stands.

That advice comes from the Attorney General, Peter Grech, who told a meeting of the Justice and Human Rights Committee of the Council of Europe a few months ago he thought an inquiry might hinder the criminal investigation.

That criminal investigation has brought about the arrest in December 2017 and the arraignment of three men charged with the murder.

This week two of the three alleged assassins filed yet another human rights claim in a long series, this time claiming that the report discussed and approved by the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly breaches their right to a fair trial because it removes the presumption of their innocence.

They site the portion of the report that says that the rapporteur’s findings are based on the assumption that the “three arrested suspects were most likely acting under instructions”.

However this assumption has not been discovered by the Council of Europe’s rapporteur Pieter Omtzigt.

In November 2018 Minister Michael Farrugia spoke to TG3 appearing to confirm a The Sunday Times story earlier saying the police were “hoping that soon those responsible are arrested”. That statement confirmed the presumption that the arrests of the three alleged assassins almost a year earlier was far from the conclusion of the search for “those responsible” for the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia.

The Degiorgio brothers and Vince Muscat filed no human rights breach complaint when the Home Minister made these remarks.

This is not to be construed as a suggestion that they should have. Merely that though they are certainly entitled to this tiresome charade of opening a human rights case every other week, the rest of us are entitled to be angry and annoyed at them.

The Degiorgios and Muscat are in court again today as the compilation of the evidence against them continues to be heard.