(Bloomberg) -- Stellantis NV Chief Executive Officer Carlos Tavares offered an olive branch after weeks of dispute with the Italian government, pledging to bolster production and highlighting efforts already made to widen its footprint in the country.

The carmaker is also open to eventually building Leapmotor cars in Italy one day should this make economic sense, the 65-year-old CEO said. Stellantis last year struck a $1.6 billion deal for a stake in Chinese EV maker Zhejiang Leapmotor Technology Ltd. to help plug a hole in a crucial market in the global EV transition.

“We share the same goals as the Italian government” to bolster output to 1 million vehicles by 2030 or even before that if possible, Tavares said in a conference call Thursday. “We want to do more in Italy. We love Italy. We love our Italian employees.”

Read more: Italy Wants to Lure New Major Carmaker in Blow to Stellantis

Tavares’s remarks come amid rising tensions between Rome and the Amsterdam-based carmaker which owns brands including Fiat, Maserati and Alfa Romeo. Stellantis has attracted criticism after hinting jobs could be at risk in its two plants of Mirafiori and Pomigliano due to a lack of EV subsidies by the Italian government. The Rome administration has since announced a package of subsidies.

Italian Industry Minister Alfredo Urso told lawmakers Wednesday that Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s government was aiming to attract a new major carmaker to Italy, a move aimed at pushing Stellantis NV to invest more in the country. 

Read More: Stellantis CEO Hits Back at Meloni, Says Italy EV Jobs at Risk

“Of course there’s a future for Pomigliano, of course there’s a future for Mirafiori,” Tavares told reporters, trying to defuse the controversy. The Pomigliano plant in southern Italy “is in full production right now, it’s very strong for a simple reason, we want to sell more Pandas,” Tavares said.

Mirafiori is suffering from challenges that are wider to the automotive industry, not just Italy, amid a slowdown of demand for EVs, the CEO said.

Tavares also noted Stellantis has been investing on two platforms in Italy, the so-called Stella Medium and Stella Large platforms, as the carmaker tackles a difficult and costly shift to electrification.

“No other country in the world has two brand new platforms,” only Italy, Tavares said.

Stellantis will be working “hand in hand” with the Italian government to boost output and Tavares also said he is “working hard with our excellent Italian employees” to give the best future possible to plants in the country.

Still, electrification and efforts to attract investments shouldn’t pit one European country against another, the CEO added.

“For Torino and Italy to win we don’t have to have somebody else lose” given the massive amounts of investments needed everywhere in the region to fight against competition from Chinese manufacturers, Tavares said.

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