Robert Aquilina has resumed his role as the Fondazione Falcone representative in Malta, he announced on Sunday morning.
He has also accepted to return to the foundation’s General Council after he had suspended himself from this role on 1 June.
Aquilina said that he accepted the invitation to take up his roles once again.
On 1 June, Aquilina resigned from his post as Honorary President of the local NGO Repubblika and had his representation and roles with Fondazione Falcone suspended after an alleged domestic violence incident. Aquilina had denied any wrongdoing.
On 12 June, in a court declaration, Jeanette Aquilina, Robert Aquilina’s wife, had formally requested that the court discontinue the domestic violence case against him. In a declaration presented in court on Thursday, she said her statements to police were being distorted and misused in a deliberate effort to damage her husband’s reputation. “I state clearly that I neither wish to be, nor will I allow myself to be, used in what I see as a campaign against my husband,” she said in a document submitted to Magistrate Lara Lanfranco in the Family Court. Jeanette emphasised that her appeal to end legal proceedings should not be interpreted as an act of pardon. She said media aligned with the Labour Party had misrepresented her intentions. She stressed that the conflict between her and her husband was rooted in private, familial tensions rather than criminal behaviour, which she attributed largely to the stress linked to Robert’s public activism. Detailing the incident from 30 May, she described a heated argument between the two of them that involved raised voices, prompting the attention of a police officer stationed outside their home for protection purposes. “At no point did the situation escalate into physical violence,” she stated unequivocally.
The court accepted the request to drop domestic violence charges against Robert Aquilina.
Writing on Sunday, Robert Aquilina said: “I am pleased to announce that I have accepted the invitation of the Falcone Foundation to resume my role as its representative in Malta with immediate effect.”
“I am also pleased to announce that I have been asked and accepted to serve as a member of the General Council of the same Falcone Foundation.”
In this announcement, the Maltese civil society figure thanked the foundation’s leadership for the trust they are “once again” putting on display towards him.
“I will repay this trust with further work in support of justice in our country and beyond,” he said.