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THE GUARDIAN. After months of standing by the prime minister, his key ally, Umberto Bossi, the leader of the Northern League, doomed their rightwing coalition with a single, characteristically blunt sentence. (Read the article bu John Hooper)
REUTERS. Sometimes Filippo Callipo, one of southern Italy's most successful businessmen, wonders why he is still alive. Callipo's refusal to play ball with the mob in an area where organized crime forces many businesses to pay extortion money and even dictates which suppliers companies must use has made him somewhat of a local legend. (Read the article by Philip Pullella)
ANSA. Italian designer Donatella Versace is set to launch her new collection for the H&M retail chain in New York. Top entertainer Prince, a friend of the designer, was expected to perform at the show that marks the fashion designer's first partnership with the Swedish retailer. (Read the article)
BUSINESS INSIDER. In pop culture, the mafia may enjoy an image romanticized by the Sopranos, the Godfather and tabloid coverage of dapper dons. Dealing with organized crime in the real world, however, is as much fun as living down the street from the Crips and Bloods. (Read the article by Caroline Chaumont)
THE MIAMI HERALD. Postwar prosperity allowed hundreds of thousands of workers to retire with full benefits before the age of 50. Public spending ran over, creating bloated bureaucracies and a political class that consume half of the national wealth generated each year. Easygoing Italians, expecting little from the state, rarely think twice about paying under the table for home improvements, dental work or even a frothy cappuccino. (Read the article by Colleen Barry)
ANSA. taly's Luna Rossa yachting team, who are backed by Italian fashion house Prada, have confirmed that they will race at the next America's Cup in San Francisco in 2013. (Read the article)
ANSA. Italian style legend Roberto Cavalli has opened his first store in Japan, in an outlying niche of Tokyo's swinging Aoyama fashion district. "Asia is the most interesting and dynamic part of the world at this time of crisis while I adore the young people of Tokyo and their revolutionary and personal style," the Florentine designer told ANSA at the inauguration. (Read the article)
THE NATIONAL. Bellucci is a renowned screen beauty; she knows it and the journalist knew it. But she's also a serious actress with a career going back 20 years, and prefers being regarded as such, rather than as a celebrity icon, sighed over longingly by fans. (Read the article by David Gritten)
STYLEBISTRO. On the fiftieth anniversary of Breakfast at Tiffany's, and simultaneously with the Rome International Film Festival, the eternal city will be honoring Audrey Hepburn for the first time with a tribute-exhibit at the Ara Pacis Museum. (Read the article)
CORRIERE DELLA SERA. The attack may have been expected. It was certainly feared. And majority politicians have been seeking to repulse, soften or slow down what they view as an “attack on the heart of the euro” but what from the outside looks like a blow to Italy’s credibility. (Read the article)