PARIS, Aug. 23 (UPI) -- Lawyers for Italian writer Cesare Battisti are asking the European human rights court to nix a French extradition decree.
The appeal was filed in early August to the Strasbourg-based court, France's Liberation newspaper reported Tuesday.
A one-time member of an Italian extremist group, Battisti had lived in France for years under special asylum grant offered by former Socialist President Francois Mitterrand.
But conservative ex-Prime Minister Jean Pierre Raffarin repealed that clause, and signed an extradition decree at Italy's request, leading to Battisti's arrest in 2004.
Battisti has since fled police watch, and his current whereabouts are unknown. He has used up all his appeal petitions in France.
Italy has sentenced Battisti in absentia to four consecutive life in prison for his alleged implication in four assassinations committed in the last 1970s when the author was a member of a leftist extremist group.
Battisti has steadfastly declared his innocence.
