Category Archives: Italy

Olive oil industry in crisis as Europe’s heatwave threatens another harvest

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World’s biggest olive producer, Spain, on course for second bad harvest in a row, raising fears of gaps on shelves and even higher prices

The olive oil industry is “in crisis”, with the heatwave in southern Europe threatening to inflict the second bad harvest in a row and gaps on shelves this autumn.

After a spring heatwave affected flowering in Spain, which produces about half the global olive crop, the harvest was forecast to be only 28% up on last year, which was the worst in almost a decade.

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Italian media more focused on foreign coverage of heatwave than its effects

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Reporting of climate crisis has been lousy for years, experts say, in a country where rightwing press has been dominant

Italy is sweltering in abnormally high temperatures, but its media appear to be more interested in how the extreme heat is being reported in the foreign press than delving deeply into the effects in a country deemed to be among the most vulnerable in Europe to the climate crisis.

Over the weekend, several outlets picked up on reports on Italy’s heatwave in leading foreign news websites – including the Guardian, the Times and the BBC. They were particularly fascinated by a headline in the Times calling Rome – where temperatures are forecast to reach highs of 43C on Tuesday – the “Infernal City”, a play on the nickname “Eternal City”. So much so that it was still a talking point come Monday.

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Extreme heatwave live: Texas city confirms first heat death; northern hemisphere boils in severe weather – as it happened

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Man in Houston died in house without air conditioning; mercury in parts of Italy is close to hitting 45C as wildfires ravage Greece and Spain

South Korean president blames botched responses for rising death toll

South Korean president Yoon Suk Yeol has blamed authorities’ failure to follow disaster response rules as the death toll from days of torrential rain grew to 39, including a dozen people found dead in a submerged underpass.

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Southern Europe braces for second heat storm in a week

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New system pushing into region from north Africa could lead to temperatures above record 48.8C

Southern Europe is bracing for a second heat storm in a week, with Italy, Greece and Spain, along with Morocco and other Mediterranean countries, being told temperature records could be broken on Tuesday.

A new anticyclone that pushed into the region from north Africa on Sunday could lift temperatures above the record 48.8C (120F) seen in Sicily in August 2021, and follows last week’s Cerberus heatwave.

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‘I’ve never seen heat this bad. It’s not normal’: Italy struggles as temperature tops 40C

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Anticyclone Caronte could send thermometer to 48C/118F as Mediterranean heatwave intensifies

• Read more: Acropolis closes to protect tourists

A fierce anticyclone named after Cerberus, a three-headed monster-dog that features in Dante’s Inferno, had not even ended before Italians were warned that a more intense one called Caronte, or Charon, who in Greek mythology was the ferryman of the dead, was on its way.

Italy sweltered in temperatures reaching highs of 38C over the weekend, while Caronte will grip the country from Monday, sending the mercury beyond 40C in central and southern regions, with the islands of Sicily and Sardinia possibly hitting a peak of 48C.

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European heatwave: red alerts issued for 16 cities in Italy

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Rome, Florence and Bologna among areas affected as forecasters say Sicily and Sardinia could face record 49C temperatures

Sixteen cities across Italy have been issued with red alerts as southern Europe continues to experience fierce heat and faces the possibility of record-breaking temperatures.

Rome, Florence and Bologna are among the areas affected by the heatwave, with forecasters suggesting that Sicily and Sardinia could see temperatures climb as high as 49C (120F), which would be the hottest ever recorded in Europe.

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Court grants reprieve to brown bear that killed Italian jogger

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Animal fatally attacked Andrea Papi, 26, who was first person to be killed in Italy by a bear in modern times

An Italian court has suspended a ruling that a brown bear should be put down for mauling to death a jogger in the Alps.

The animal, a 17-year-old female identified as JJ4, was captured after the fatal attack on Andrea Papi, 26, near his village of Caldes on 5 April. He was the first person in Italy to be killed in a bear attack in modern times.

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European heatwave to lead to 55mph gusts in UK, warns Met Office

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Sweltering temperatures in Europe directing low-pressure systems towards UK and yellow wind warning is in place

Sweltering temperatures in Europe are forecast to lead to 55mph winds and heavy rain in the UK due to low-pressure systems being directed towards the country.

The Met Office has issued a yellow wind warning that is in place across south-west England and Wales until Friday evening, while another covering areas of central and southern England will come in on Saturday morning.

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Hollywood on the Tiber: stars return to Rome studios once home to Heston and Fellini

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Sprawling Cinecittà complex is in demand again thanks to tax breaks and boom in film and TV production

Walk through the 1930s-built, dusty pink gates of Cinecittà, the legendary film studios in Rome, and the magic of its golden era is immediately palpable. This is where Charlton Heston rode to victory in his chariot race in Ben Hur, which went on to win 11 Oscars. It is where the real-life love affair between Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton played out on the set of Cleopatra, and where Federico Fellini produced classics including La Dolce Vita and Amarcord.

The sprawling Cinecittà was opened with great pomp by Benito Mussolini in 1937, in part to make films promoting the dictator’s fascist propaganda. During the second world war it was first occupied by the Nazis and later became a refuge to the thousands made homeless by the allied bombing of the Italian capital.

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Italian man cleared of assault because grope only lasted ‘between five and 10 seconds’

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Judge trying case of caretaker accused of sexually assaulting teenage student rules grope too fleeting to be a crime

An Italian judge has provoked outrage after clearing a school caretaker of sexually assaulting a teenage girl because the grope lasted only “a handful of seconds”.

A 17-year-old student at a school in Rome complained of being groped by the caretaker as she walked up a staircase with a friend in April 2022.

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Pistoletto sculpture destroyed in suspected arson attack in Naples

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Venus of the Rags, one of the contemporary Italian artist’s most famous works, was burnt to cinders

One of the most famous works by Italian contemporary artist Michelangelo Pistoletto, Venus of the Rags, has been burnt to cinders in a suspected arson attack in Naples.

The installation, in which a statue of the Roman goddess of love, beauty and fertility stands next to a vast pile of coloured, discarded clothes, was destroyed where it stood on display near the town hall in the southern Italian city.

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Italy heatwave could push temperatures close to European record

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High pressure forecast to raise temperatures to 48C as hot weather sweeps Spain, France, Germany and Poland

Temperatures in Italy could get close to breaking a European record this week as a fierce heatwave grips much of the continent.

An anticyclone – an area of high pressure – named Cerberus will cause temperatures to exceed 40C (104F) across much of the country by Wednesday, with the islands of Sicily and Sardinia predicted to bear the brunt at 47-48C.

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Silvio Berlusconi leaves €100m to partner Marta Fascina in his will

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Three-time Italian prime minister leaves overall control of family holding company to two eldest children

The late Silvio Berlusconi left €100m (£85.4m) to his partner, Marta Fascina, in his will and control of the family holding company, Fininvest, to his two eldest children, a source has confirmed.

The three-time Italian prime minister, who died last month and whose empire is estimated to be worth more than €6bn, also left €100m to his brother, Paolo, and €30m to Marcello Dell’Utri, a former senator with his Forza Italia party who served jail time for association with the mafia.

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Italian men hid father’s body so they could claim his pension, police believe

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Body of Bruno Delnegro was found in a cave in Abruzzo last year, with three sons and girlfriend of one now under investigation

Italian police believe that the body of man found by walkers in a remote spot in the Abruzzo region a year ago had been left there by his sons who continued to pocket his pension.

The body of Bruno Delnegro, who died of natural causes, was found by two Canadian walkers last July in a cave about 215 miles (350km) from his home in Trani, in the southern Puglia region.

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Tourist from England suspected to have carved name on Colosseum wall

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Male suspect reportedly from Bristol could face a prison term of up to five years for the widely condemned act

Italian police have identified a man from England as the suspected culprit behind an inscription carved into a wall of the Colosseum, after a four-day search.

A young man wearing a blue flowery shirt was filmed by an onlooker using a key to scratch his and his girlfriend’s name into an internal wall of the 2,000-year-old monument last Friday. If convicted, the suspect could face a hefty fine and prison term under Italy’s strict cultural heritage protection laws.

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Outcry after tourist carves name on wall at the Colosseum in Rome

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Italy’s culture minister has called for the man who defaced the site with ‘Ivan+Hayley 23’ to be identified and prosecuted

Italian police are on the hunt for a young tourist who carved his and his girlfriend’s names into a wall of the Colosseum, sparking widespread condemnation.

The English-speaking tourist was filmed by an onlooker using keys to engrave “Ivan+Hayley 23” into the wall of the 2,000-year-old Roman amphitheatre on Friday afternoon.

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Pompeii fresco find possibly depicts 2,000-year-old form of pizza

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Ancient painting includes fruit that looks like a pineapple – although it is almost certainly something else

A striking still life fresco resembling a pizza has been found among the ruins of ancient Pompeii, although the dish seems to lack two essential ingredients – tomato and mozzarella – and includes an item that looks suspiciously like a pineapple.

The fresco, which dates back 2,000 years, emerged during excavations in the Regio IX area of Pompeii’s archaeological park, which is close to Naples, the birthplace of pizza. The painting was on a wall in what is believed to have been the hallway of a home that had a bakery in its annexe.

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37 people missing after boat capsizes between Tunisia and Lampedusa

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Boat capsized in strong winds with most passengers feared dead, according to four survivors cited by migrants’ organisation

Thirty-seven people are missing after their boat capsized between Tunisia and the Italian island of Lampedusa, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said on Friday, citing an account by four survivors of the shipwreck.

The UN agency said the survivors, all from sub-Saharan Africa, arrived on Lampedusa late on Thursday, having been rescued from the shipwreck by another vessel.

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Rare find of 24 ancient bronzes in Tuscany goes on display in Rome

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Statues were unearthed last year in what was a place of worship for both the Etruscans and Romans

A trove of bronze statues buried by mud and boiling water for thousands of years before being found in the ruins of a network of ancient thermal springs in a small town in Tuscany are going on display in Rome.

The 24 bronzes, mostly dedicated to the gods, are the largest discovery of their kind in Italy and were unearthed last year in the ancient springs of San Casciano dei Bagni, in what used to be a place of worship for both the Etruscans and Romans.

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