Giorgia Meloni (left) posted a photo of herself with Nicoletta Golisano
(Picture: Instagram)A friend of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni was among three women killed when a man pulled out a gun and opened fire at a meeting of residents of an apartment block in Rome.
Ms Meloni posted a picture of herself alongside Nicoletta Golisano, one of the victims, on Instagram on Sunday night.
“For me she will always be beautiful and happy like this,” she wrote alongside the photograph.
“It is not right to die like this.”
Police arrested a 57-year-old man who had been overpowered by other residents after the shooting in a meeting held at a bar in the Fidene district of the city.
The suspect was a local man who had been in a series of disputes with the residents’ association, a witness told Rai News.
“He came into the room, closed the door and shouted ‘I’ll kill you all’ and then started to shoot,” Italian news agency Ansa quoted another witness as saying.
Four other people were wounded in the shooting, with at least one of them suffering serious injuries.
Ms Meloni said a shooting range from which the suspect had taken the gun used in the attack had been closed and placed under investigation by the authorities.
Rome Mayor Roberto Gualtieri called an emergency security meeting after what he called “the grave episode of violence that has struck our city”.
In a tweet, he confirmed three people were killed in the shooting in the working-class neighbourhood.
“The shooting occurred in an enclosed outdoor seating area of the bar, called 'Il Posto Giusto,' or 'The Right Place’,” he wrote.
