Category Archives: Italy

Four migrant workers reportedly burned alive in their car in attack in Italy

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Petrol station attack in Calabria throws spotlight on widespread exploitation of foreign farm labourers

The exploitation of farm workers in Italy has come under the spotlight again after four men – three Afghans and one from Pakistan – were allegedly burned alive in a car at a petrol station in Calabria.

The attack was captured by a surveillance camera at the garage in Amendolara, close to Cosenza. Two Pakistani nationals have been arrested on charges of aggravated murder, according to public prosecutor Alessandro D’Alessio.

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‘What happened to the testicles?’: mockery in Milan over bull mosaic’s restoration

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Rampant Bull needed a makeover after wear and tear from tourists, but refurbishment ‘castrated’ it, critics say

The restoration of a floor mosaic in Milan called the Rampant Bull has been mocked after the works appear to have erased a crucial anatomical detail – its testicles.

The 19th-century mosaic in the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II shopping arcade needed a makeover because a small crater had formed in the tiny pink tiles featuring the bull’s testicles, due to the constant stream of tourists performing a heel-spinning gesture.

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Kanye West concert in Italy cancelled over ‘public order and safety issues’

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Reggio Emilia prefect stops gig after Jewish community ‘concerns’ over rapper’s previous antisemitic remarks

A Kanye West concert in Italy has been cancelled over “public order and safety issues”.

The 48-year-old rapper, who changed his name to Ye in 2021, was due to perform at the Pulse of Gaia festival at the RCF Arena in Reggio Emilia on 18 July, but the city’s prefect, Salvatore Angieri, stopped the gigs after “concerns” from the local Jewish community over previous antisemitic remarks by West.

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Seven heat-related deaths in France as May records set in several countries

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Extreme early summer event across western Europe also brings highest temperatures for month in UK and Ireland

Seven people have died in France in an extreme early summer heat event affecting a swathe of western Europe, with record high temperatures for May recorded for a second day in several countries.

In France, which logged its hottest ever May day on Monday and again on Tuesday, the weather agency Météo France said the heatwave could last through the week and predicted temperatures could reach 39C in some areas.

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Italy’s top court rules against tourist refused tap water in Dolomites hotel

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Woman argued water was a ‘universal human right’ but court ruled no law obliged hoteliers to serve it from taps

A tourist’s simple request for a glass of tap water at a hotel restaurant in the Italian Dolomites has culminated in Italy’s top court ruling that being served water from the tap is not consumer right, after a lengthy and costly legal saga.

The case dates back to 2019, when the woman spent a week at the five-star hotel in the ski resort of Corvara, in Badia, over Christmas and New Year. She was on a half-board deal with the evening meal included, except for drinks.

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Carlo Petrini, Slow Food movement founder, dies aged 76

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Italy’s president leads tributes to campaigner who spent four decades promoting sustainability and local cuisine

Carlo Petrini, the journalist who founded the Slow Food movement in protest against the arrival of the first McDonald’s in Italy, has died aged 76.

Petrini, who had been diagnosed with prostate cancer in recent years, died in his home town of Bra in northern Italy’s Piedmont region. He had led Slow Food, which since 1986 has campaigned against fast-food culture by promoting sustainability and local cuisine, as president until 2022.

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Italian police stop party attended by Mick Jagger over music ban

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Music is banned on Wednesdays on island of Stromboli where Rolling Stones frontman was celebrating wrapping a film

Police on an Italian island stopped a party attended by Mick Jagger – because music is banned on Wednesdays.

The Rolling Stones frontman was on Stromboli, the volcanic island among Sicily’s Aeolian archipelago, for the production of Three Incestuous Sisters, a film by the Italian director Alice Rohrwacher in which he stars.

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British Council staff in Italy to strike over proposed 80% workforce cut

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Soft power institution faces funding crisis linked to Covid-era government loan due to be repaid by September

Staff at the British Council in Italy will go on strike over deep cuts that would slash about 80% of its workforce due to a funding crisis facing the organisation.

Out of 130 of its teaching staff across Rome, Milan and Naples, 108 are being targeted as teaching activities in Italy face the axe. The move would end 80 years of British Council English language teaching in Italy as part of the organisation’s global mission to promote British culture and education across the world, sources said.

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‘It was like a mosh pit’: Swatch closes stores as watch launch causes crowding and scuffles

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French police fire teargas and UK shops close for safety reasons as hundreds queue for Royal Pop timepieces that make up Audemars Piguet collaboration

The launch of limited-edition Swatch watches descended into chaos in several European cities and New York, with French police firing teargas to restore order at a store near Paris.

Hundreds of people waited through the night from Friday into Saturday – and in some cases for several days – hoping to buy the Royal Pop timepieces, made in collaboration with the luxury watchmaker Audemars Piguet.

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Seven people injured after man drives car into pedestrians in northern Italy

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Man in 30s arrested over incident in Modena that left two seriously hurt

Eight people were injured, two seriously, on Saturday after a car rammed into a group of pedestrians in the northern Italian city of Modena.

Police said the driver, in his 30s, had been arrested. He is also alleged to have attempted to stab a passerby who had tried to stop him from fleeing the scene.

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Maldives diver dies in operation to recover bodies of Italians from cave

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Mohamed Mahudhee suffered decompression sickness after searching for scuba divers in Vaavu Atoll and died in hospital

A Maldivian military diver has died during a high-risk operation to recover the bodies of four of the Italian scuba divers who drowned while exploring a deep underwater cave in the Maldives.

The diver suffered underwater decompression sickness after searching for the bodies of the Italians who, according to Italy’s foreign ministry, had “apparently died while attempting to explore caves at a depth of 50 metres (164ft)”.

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Sicily police investigate illegal race with horse-drawn carts and Kalashnikovs

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Horses seized and several people questioned after animal rights activist shares video of race along country roads

A video showing an illegal horse race in Sicily, with spectators firing pistols into the air and brandishing Kalashnikov rifles, has prompted a police investigation that has led to the seizure of the animals.

The clip, reportedly filmed last Friday, shows two jockeys driving horse-drawn carts at breakneck speed along country roads in the town of Palagonia, near Catania, in eastern Sicily. Behind them, dozens of people follow on scooters, firing shots into the air. The footage was posted on social media by an animal rights activist named Enrico Rizzi.

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Vatican stresses need for peace as Rubio meets pope amid strained relations

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US secretary of state speaks with Leo and officials after tensions following attacks by Trump over Iran war

The Vatican has said it raised the “need to work tirelessly in favour of peace” in talks with the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, who is in Rome on a trip widely regarded as an effort to ease tensions after Donald Trump’s repeated criticisms of Pope Leo.

Amid unprecedented strain on relations between the Holy See and Washington, Rubio was received by the pope on Thursday at the Apostolic Palace, before holding a series of meetings with Vatican officials

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Pope Leo rejects claim he supports nuclear weapons after Trump tirade

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Pontiff responds after US president accuses him of ‘endangering a lot of Catholics’ with stance on Iran war

Pope Leo has said he has never supported nuclear weapons and that those who criticise him need to speak the truth, in response to Donald Trump’s latest tirade accusing him of “endangering a lot of Catholics” with his stance on the Iran war.

Speaking to journalists on Tuesday night after leaving the papal retreat in Castel Gandolfo, near Rome, the first US-born pontiff said: “The mission of the church is to preach the gospel, to preach peace.”

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Trump accuses pope of ‘endangering a lot of Catholics’ with Iran stance

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US president directs fresh criticism at pontiff days before secretary of state Marco Rubio’s visit to Vatican

Donald Trump has issued another verbal attack against Pope Leo, accusing the pontiff of “endangering a lot of Catholics” because “he thinks it’s fine for Iran to have a nuclear weapon”.

The remarks come two days before Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, meets Leo at the Vatican in an effort to ease the tensions sparked by Trump’s previous broadside against the Chicago-born pontiff over his condemnation of the US-Israeli war on Iran.

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Marco Rubio to meet pope this week after Trump’s broadside against Leo

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US secretary of state’s two-day visit reportedly intended to thaw Washington’s frosty relations with Vatican and Italy

The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, will meet Pope Leo on Thursday, weeks after Donald Trump’s unprecedented broadside against the pontiff.

Rubio will meet the first US-born pope privately in the Vatican’s apostolic palace at 11.30am (10.30 GMT), the Holy See’s press office confirmed on Monday after media reports on Sunday.

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Marco Rubio to visit Rome, reportedly to ‘thaw’ US relations with Pope and Meloni

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US secretary of state will be in Italian capital on Thursday and Friday, the one-year anniversary of Pope Leo’s papacy

The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, is to travel to Rome this week for a visit reportedly aimed at thawing frosty relations with the Italian government and the Vatican.

Rubio is scheduled to be in the Italian capital on Thursday and Friday, which will also mark the one-year anniversary of the papacy of Pope Leo, the first US-born pontiff.

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Ancient Roman gravestone found in New Orleans back yard returned to Italy

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Nearly 2,000-year-old artifact handed over by FBI matches piece missing from museum near Rome for decades

A nearly 2,000-year-old Roman grave marker discovered in a New Orleans backyard has now been returned to Italy.

The marble epitaph – dating back roughly 1,900 years – was officially handed over to Italian officials in Rome on Wednesday during a ceremony led by the FBI. The event also marked the repatriation of another antiquity recovered in the US, the agency said.

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Venice Biennale jury quits amid row over participation of Russia

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Decision follows backlash from Italian government and European Commission

The jury of the Venice Biennale has quit just days before the prestigious art exhibition is due to begin, amid a row over the decision to allow Russia to participate.

The resignation of the five-member international jury was announced late on Thursday in a brief statement by the Venice Biennale organisers, and came a day after the Italian culture ministry sent inspectors to Venice in search of information about the decision to allow Russia to have a pavilion at the event.

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Lost copy of seventh-century poem in Old English discovered at Rome library

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Dublin scholars find 1,200-year-old manuscript of Caedmon’s Hymn composed by Northumbrian cattle herder

A lost copy of a poem composed in the seventh century by a Northumbrian cattle herder – the earliest surviving poem in the English language – has been discovered in Rome.

Scholars from Trinity College Dublin (TCD) uncovered the manuscript that contains Caedmon’s Hymn at the National Central Library of Rome.

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