Italian News

This week marks the 279th anniversary of the birth of Lazaro Spallanzani, a chemist who showed that contact by semen is necessary for development of the egg, and who achieved the first successful artificial insemination of a dog.

The Pope has reportedly told the Mayor of Rome, Walter Veltroni, that parts of the city are in a degraded state.

Not as bad as Naples, however, where the army has been brought out to reopen the schools which had been closed due to the rubbish piled outside. All Naples’ rubbish tips are full, having been taken over by the Camorra, the local mafia, which ran them as a business.

Lufthansa has denied press speculation that it would ally itself with Italy's biggest private airline, Air One, in an attempt to acquire a controlling stake in Italian national carrier Alitalia. Failing a last minute bid from Indonesia’s Air Garuda it looks as if they’re stuck with the French

Officials in Verona have imposed a graffiti ban at Juliet’s house. Visitors were invited to leave messages of love by email and SMS to be shown on a screen inside. To the astonishment of the Council, people found this unromantic and have taken to sticking notes to the marble walls with chewing gum. The house is being frantically cleaned in time for Valentines Day. It is thought to be good luck to caress the right breast of the statue of Juliet, which presumably keeps that, at least, clean.

Italy's new waste czar is the ex-national police chief Gianni De Gennaro. Interestingly Naples’ patron saint is San Gennaro so the Pope may have been involved after all. Legend has it that on his feast day Gennaro’s dried blood liquefies, although a way will be found to throw this away, too.
Speaking after his first day on the job, the earthly Gennaro said he would approach his task ''with the conviction that problems can be solved with a rationale of common sense, balance, dialogue and direct and transparent communication''. Nothing about actually throwing the stuff away.

The puzzle of where the mysterious antimatter at the heart of our galaxy comes from has finally been solved, according to Giovanni Fabrizio Bignami, head of the Italian Space Agency, who has collaborated with the international group of scientists which has just published a paper outlining the answer. It appears it is the latest attempt to solve Naples’ rubbish crisis.

The traders who sell pigeon food to tourists in St Mark's Square Venice expressed anguish on Thursday after city hall passed a measure banning them from ever doing so again.

The regrouping techniques of Rome's starlings could offer lessons for students of unpredictable behaviour like investor trends and consumer fads, a new Italian-led study says. Early reports are that the birds squawk with a Venetian accent, and are asking the way to Naples.

The famous volcanic eruption in which Vesuvius buried Pompeii and Herculaneum was so powerful that some of the ash and lava ended up in Greece, according to researchers at Thessaloniki University. An expert from the Aristotle University was quoted as saying the layer of volcanic ash and rock was three metres deep in places, studded with spaghetti wrappers and empty tins of tomato.

Latest reports are that the Waste Czar has finally located a rubbish free spot. In Verona.