Meloni's conservative government has repeatedly clashed with Stellantis in recent weeks, complaining that the firm was not making enough cars in Italy while cashing in on its brands' Italian allure.

"The head of a major company must know that government subsidies cannot be tailored for a specific company," Meloni told reporters during a trip to Japan, adding that she thought the comments attributed to Tavares were "quite bizarre".

Tavares told reporters last month that insufficient Italian incentives had led to several months of reduced automotive production in Italy, and repeated his criticism in an interview with Bloomberg last week.

Meloni said she had not been able to find the Bloomberg interview, but the government had invested around one billion euros on incentives and was very focused on the automobile industry.

"We are always willing and open (to help) with whatever might produce jobs in Italy, but clearly if people think that producing in other countries where there is a lower production cost is better, I can't say anything," Meloni said.

"But don't tell me that the car is Italian and don't sell it as Italian," she added.

(Reporting by Crispian Balmer, editing by Gavin Jones)