Municipal elections were held in the six municipalities of the Anglo-American occupation zone ('Zone A') of the

Free Territory of Trieste The Free Territory of Trieste was an independent territory in Southern Europe between northern Italy and Yugoslavia, facing the north part of the Adriatic Sea, under direct responsibility of the United Nations Security Council in the aftermath ...

in June 1949,

Trieste Trieste ( , ; sl, Trst ; german: Triest ) is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is the capital city, and largest city, of the autonomous region of Friuli Venezia Giulia, one of two autonomous regions which are not subdivided into prov ...

Duino-Aurisina Duino-Aurisina ( sl, Devin-Nabrežina, german: Thübein-Nabreschin, also ; vec, label= Triestine, Duin-Aurisina) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Trieste in the Italian region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia. Lying near the border with ...

San Dorligo della Valle San Dorligo della Valle ( sl, Dolina; Triestine: or ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Italian region Friuli-Venezia Giulia, located about southeast of Trieste, on the border with Slovenia. As of 31 December 2004, it had a population of 6, ...

Sgonico Sgonico ( sl, Zgonik; Triestine: ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Trieste in the Italian region Friuli-Venezia Giulia, located about northwest of Trieste, on the border with Slovenia. , it had a population of 2,130 and an are ...

Monrupino Monrupino ( sl, Repentabor) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Trieste in the Italian region Friuli-Venezia Giulia, located about north of Trieste, on the border with Slovenia. , it had a population of 848 and an area of .All demo ...

and

Muggia Muggia ( vec, label=Venetian, Triestine dialect, Muja; german: Mulgs; fur, Mugle; sl, Milje) is an Italian town and ''comune'' in the south-west of the Province of Trieste, in the region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia on the border with Slovenia. Lying ...

.
COMMUNIST PARTY OF THE FREE TERRITORY OF TRIESTE SUCCEEDS AT THE MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS
'. ''Current Digest of the Post-Soviet Press'', No. 25, Vol.1, July 19, 1949, p. 34Zucca, Lorenzo.

' There were 197,266 eligible voters in the electoral rolls in Trieste and a combined number of 15,392 eligible voters in the five other municipalities. The elections were largely symbolic, as the elected officials had no formal decision-making over the

Allied Military Government The Allied Military Government of Occupied Territories (originally abbreviated AMGOT, later AMG) was the form of military rule administered by Allied forces during and after World War II within European territories they occupied. Notable AMGOT ...

(AMG), which controlled the most areas of administration. Ahead of the elections, the AMG intervened in order to boost the pro-Italian conservative Christian Democracy (DC) party. The Christian Democrats were also supported by the mainstream press, represented by newspapers such as '' Messaggero Veneto'' and ''Giornale di Trieste''. In their election campaign the Christian Democrats and their pro-Italian allies ran an anti-Slavic campaign, accusing their communist opponents of being anti-religious. As such the election campaign followed the pattern of the Italian general election of 1948, in which the Christian Democrats and other moderate elements had campaigned on the plank of whipping up fears of a communist takeover of Italy. The Christian Democratic campaign struck a chord especially amongst women voters in the Free Territory, who were allowed to vote for the first time.Sluga, Glenda.
The Problem of Trieste and the Italo-Yugoslav Border: Difference, Identity, and Sovereignty in Twentieth Century Europe
'. Albany: State Univ. of New York Press, 2001. p. 150 The

Communist Party of the Free Territory of Trieste The Communist Party of the Free Territory of Trieste ( it, Partito Comunista del Territorio Libero di Trieste, PCTLT; sl, Komunistična partija Svobodnega tržaškega ozemlja, KPSTO) was a communist party in the Free Territory of Trieste. It was ...

(PCTLT), which had initially supported the incorporation of the Free Territory with

Yugoslavia Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label=Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavija ...

,Puppini, Marco.
Il quadro politico dopo il trattato di pace del 1947 e la risoluzione del Cominform del 1948
''. Consorzio Culturale del Monfalconese had been divided as a result of the rupture between the

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

and Yugoslavia in 1948. The pro-Yugoslav fraction was now regrouped in the Slovenian-Italian Popular Front (FPIS), with the daily newspaper ''

Primorski dnevnik ''Primorski dnevnik'' ( en, The Littoral Daily), mostly known as ''Primorski'', is a Slovene language daily newspaper published in Trieste, Italy. It is the only Slovene daily in any country other than Slovenia, and one of the three historical dai ...

'' as their press outlet. A third force was the Independence Front, which sought to convert the Free Territory into an independent state.

In Trieste

Other municipalities

The elections in the five smaller municipalities were marked by victories of the Communist Party and its front organization, the

Slavic-Italian Anti-Fascist Union The Slavic-Italian Anti-Fascist Union ( it, Unione Antifascista Italo-Slava, abbreviated UAIS, sl, Slovansko-italijanska antifašistična unija, abbreviated SIAU) was a political movement in the Free Territory of Trieste. It was the most importan ...

. The Communist Party won 57% of the votes in Muggia (8,039 votes, whilst the Titoist FPIS obtained 1,387 votes), and the Slavic-Italian Anti-Fascist Union won 33% of the total vote in Duino-Aurisina, 55% in San Dorligo della Valle, 51% in Sgonico and 97% in Monrupino. These results were heralded by ''

Pravda ''Pravda'' ( rus, Правда, p=ˈpravdə, a=Ru-правда.ogg, "Truth") is a Russian broadsheet newspaper, and was the official newspaper of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, when it was one of the most influential papers in the ...

'' as a victory for the Communist Party.

References

{{reflist

Elections in the Free Territory of Trieste July 1949 events in Europe