Silvio Berlusconi has won his third Italian election with a bigger-than-expected swing to the centre right, but the media magnate said it would not be easy to solve deep economic problems. Votes were still being counted on Tuesday, but with Berlusconi’s victory clear on Monday evening, centre-left leader Walter Veltroni called to concede defeat.
Self-made billionaire Silvio Berslusconi looked set to secure a third term as Italian prime minister on Monday, with exit polls predicting a narrow win for his conservative coalition in general elections. The exit polls, which came moments after voting ended, predicted the 71-year-old media magnate’s centre-right coalition would win.
Italians have a last chance to vote on Monday in a two-day parliamentary election that could restore conservative billionaire Silvio Berlusconi as prime minister of a country on the brink of recession. Many Italians doubt, however, that Italy’s 62nd government since World War II will revive the economy.
Silvio Berlusconi on Thursday appealed to Italian voters to give him a huge majority at the general election on Sunday and Monday. He said that ”to really govern” he needed a margin of at least 20 seats in the Senate, the Upper House of the Italian Parliament. That would allow him ”to take, if necessary, difficult and unpopular decisions”.
Cristiano Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney gave Manchester United a clinical 2-0 win at AS Roma on Tuesday in the first leg of their Champions League quarterfinal. Portugal forward Ronaldo soared inside the area six minutes before the break to head home a Paul Scholes cross after Rooney had skipped away from Philippe Mexes.
Brazilian Formula One driver Felipe Massa this week vowed to bounce back from his fruitless start to the season. The Ferrari man retired from the first two Grands Prix of the season in Australia and Malaysia and already trails Great Britain’s Championship leader Lewis Hamilton of McLaren by 14 points.
With a solitary win over regular wooden-spoon rivals Scotland, Nick Mallett did not disappoint in his maiden Six Nations as Italy coach, but he did not surpass expectations either. Results-wise, the campaign is a step back from last season, when the Azzurri secured their best showing of two wins under his predecessor Pierre Berbizier.
A court in Sicily has ruled that an accused Mafioso can be put under house arrest because he is too fat for any Italian jail. Salvatore Ferranti, who weighs 210kg, was allowed to go home after spending six months in four Italian prisons, his lawyer said, confirming a local newspaper report.
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/ 24 February 2008
”It’s me,” the man said. ”I’m the real Pasquale Condello.” I Cacciatori, the Hunters — the Carabinieri’s specialist man-trackers entrusted with the last stage of the operation to net ”The Supremo” — had left nothing to chance. They were convinced the 57-year-old mobster lived in one of 12 flats on the outskirts of Reggio Calabria.
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/ 11 February 2008
Italy’s South African coach Nick Mallett said he was frustrated by his side’s two crucial first-half mistakes that cost them a first-ever victory over England. Italy lost 23-19 at Rome’s Stadio Olimpico in the Six Nations on Sunday in a match where they came as close as ever to beating England in 14 attempts.
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/ 6 February 2008
Italy’s president dissolved Parliament on Wednesday and the caretaker government prepared to call a snap election, likely in mid-April, that could mark a return to power of media magnate Silvio Berlusconi. President Giorgio Napolitano’s bid for cross-party support to reform Italy’s messy voting rules before a fresh election met stiff resistance from Berlusconi.
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/ 30 January 2008
South African ”Bladerunner” Oscar Pistorius vowed in an interview with Italian television on Tuesday to continue his fight to have an Olympic ban overturned. The disabled sprinter, who runs with carbon-fibre blade attachments, wants to be allowed to compete in the normal Olympics as well as the Paralympics.
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/ 25 January 2008
Italy’s president will hold crisis talks with political leaders on Friday to see whether he can avoid calling snap elections after a no confidence vote forced Prime Minister Romano Prodi’s government to resign. Prodi stepped down late on Thursday after losing, as expected, the vote in the Senate.
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/ 16 January 2008
The prankster who poured red dye into the waters of Rome’s landmark Trevi Fountain was at it again on Wednesday when he targeted another of the city’s landmarks — dropping thousands of coloured plastic balls down the Spanish Steps. Graziano Cecchini said he had released more than 500 000 balls down the steps.
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/ 15 January 2008
Sicily’s Mafia rakes in more than €1-billion a year through extortion, according to a study to be published on Friday. Between 2002 and 2006, the Cosa Nostra earned more than €6-billion from Sicilian businesses forced to pay ”pizzo”, according to extracts of the study published on Tuesday.
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/ 30 December 2007
Tens of thousands of people are expected to take part in a giant New Year’s kiss in front of St Mark’s Basilica in the romantic Italian city of Venice, authorities said this week. "New Year 2008 in Venice will become the New Year of love," the Venice municipality said on its website.
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/ 19 December 2007
An Italian court has ruled that a couple could not name their son Friday and ordered that he instead be called Gregory after the saint whose feast day he was born on. ”I think it is ridiculous they even opened a case about it,” said the family’s lawyer, Paola Rossi.
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/ 5 December 2007
Italy is the dream destination of exchange students, but student photos of drunken antics exposed by media coverage of a British girl’s murder last month have cast a sobering light on their lifestyle. After the murder of Meredith Kercher in the university town of Perugia, the media discovered a trove of material posted by Perugia students and friends on the web.
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/ 28 November 2007
A rooster crowing at the break of dawn has earned his owner a €200 fine in an Italian court after neighbours complained it was waking them up too early. Ansa news agency reported on Wednesday that the rooster’s owner in Bolzano province would appeal the sentence on the grounds that he needs at least one rooster to breed chickens.
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/ 12 November 2007
A police officer who supposedly killed a soccer fan was placed under investigation on Monday for manslaughter, news reports said, a day after the shooting led to riots across Italy and forced the suspension or postponement of three matches. Authorities detained four people on Monday for taking part in the violence in Rome.
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/ 25 October 2007
An advertising campaign to counter discrimination against gays has stirred up passions in Italy, using a poster that shows a newborn with the word ”homosexual” written on his wristband. ”Sexual orientation is not a choice,” reads the slogan on the poster that was going up all across the central-northern Tuscany region.
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/ 15 October 2007
More than 150 countries are scheduled to observe World Food Day on Tuesday by kicking off a series of events including sports contests and a global candlelight vigil, the Food and Agriculture Organisation has said. This year’s World Food Day theme is The Right to Food.
A priest who openly professed his love for a parishioner has been defrocked by the Italian Catholic Church despite an overwhelming show of support from his congregation, press reports said on Tuesday. Padua Bishop Antonio Mattiazzo issued a decree on Monday forbidding Don Sante Sguotti to hear confession in Monterosso, near the northern city of Padua.
Former South Africa coach Nick Mallett was on Wednesday named as the new man in charge of the Italian national side, the country’s rugby federation announced. Mallett succeeds Pierre Berbizier, whose time at the helm of the Azzurri came to an end with Italy’s first-round elimination from the World Cup in France.
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/ 28 September 2007
A hospital error mixing up the X-rays of two similarly named patients led to the death of one of them after her perfectly healthy kidney was removed, the Italian press reported on Friday. The 54-year-old woman died of a likely embolism on Thursday, two days after undergoing the unnecessary operation, the reports said.
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/ 24 September 2007
Two Italian soldiers kidnapped in western Afghanistan last week were freed in a raid by Nato-led forces early on Monday, Italy’s Defence Ministry said. The soldiers were wounded during the raid to free them, one of them seriously, the ministry said, adding that they had been taken to a hospital.
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/ 17 September 2007
Venice Mayor Massimo Cacciari wants to step up his war on pigeons, going so far as to outlaw wedding parties from throwing the traditional handful of rice at newlyweds, Italian media reported on Monday. The daily <i>La Repubblica</i> said the draft ordinance would prohibit the throwing of rice outside the Palazzo Cavalli wedding hall.
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/ 14 September 2007
Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir said on Friday that his government would observe a ceasefire in Darfur after peace talks start next month, on a visit to Rome that has drawn criticism in Italy and abroad. He urged Europe to pressure rebel leaders to attend talks with Khartoum due to start on October 27 in Libya.
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/ 6 September 2007
The Italian tenor in full cry is what we mean when we say opera, which remains, in that sense, a man’s world. The names of Caruso, Gigli, Pavarotti are code for operatic achievement, while the legendary divas they partnered only register with opera fans.
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/ 6 September 2007
Italian opera star Luciano Pavarotti, hailed by many as the greatest tenor of his generation, died in the early hours of Thursday, his manager Terri Robson said. ”Luciano Pavarotti died one hour ago,” Robson said in an SMS to Reuters. He was 71. He shot to fame with a stand-in appearance at London’s Covent Garden in 1963 and had soon had critics gushing about his voluminous voice.
Italian police on Thursday arrested 40 suspected Mafiosi at the centre of a mob feud police blame for the execution-style killings of six Italians in Germany. Camouflage-clad police backed by helicopters swooped into the southern Italian mountain village of San Luca, the epicentre of a 16-year-old feud inside the Calabrian underworld organisation.
The Vatican may have territorial limits, its own post office and even a football tournament, but it has hitherto lacked what all real states offer: an airline. That will be put right this month as the Vatican launches its first charter flights for pilgrims from Rome to Lourdes, with some of the world’s top religious destinations to follow, including the shrine of Fatima in Portugal and the shrine of the Madonna of Guadalupe in Mexico.