Msycamore: Now the question is, is this the original Italian 1971 release? or is it the only Italian version pre-'04 CGI version? or maybe just an International-cut/TV-cut? It's very interesting anyway.

Well, it would be hard to say if it is a TV cut without another source to compare it with, and impossible to say unless there is some sort of commercial tape to compare it with. It is certainly possible that it was edited for both time and content so that it could run on television. I was going to say its a bit unlikely they would have spent the time and money doing all the foreign dubs for the 1978 re-issue, especially since re-issues are mainly on a territory by territory basis. However, the German version that is analyzed on a link posted on this page says that its less than a minute shorter than the UK version. I must assume that the UK VHS compared is based on the 1978 cut, since this is (reportedly, anyway) the only version ever released on home video until the DC.

So, either both the UK VHS and German TV versions are both the 1971 theatrical cut, which is not very likely, or the German version had the extra scenes added sometime in or after 1978. This is complicated by dubbing versus subtitles. It's not said whether the German version was dubbed or subtitled; if it was subtitled, it's no wonder the 1978 cut was ported, since it required extremely little work, unlike dubbing. The Italian version in discussion here is dubbed, so it would require more work on the part of Warners to port over the 1978 cut and thus slightly less likely.