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  • In his customary cordial way, President Giorgio Napolitano read the political elite of Italy the polite equivalent of the riot act. On Tuesday the president made his traditional end-of-year address to the ranking elders of the Italian state, and it obviously represented a carefully considered sermon. He also insinuated that he will end his term of office Jan. 14, after which a new president must be chosen.
  • Italians architects continue to be world leaders in design. Renzo Piano, 77, is the creator of no less than 21 projects for museums all over the world; only the most recent is his redesign for the once stodgy Harvard Art Museum in Boston. Now Stefano Boeri, 58, has just won the $62,000 International Highrise Award for his “Bosco Verticale” (Vertical Woodland) twin high rise-towers of 111 and 78 floors respectively in Milan.
  • Approaching his ninetieth birthday, President Giorgio Napolitano will neither confirm nor deny reports that he will announce his resignation by the end of the year. But even without confirmation his resignation is being taken for granted, and the fallout is already having a tremendous effect upon the entire political scene.
  • Workaday Milan was thrown into a small tizzy Wednesday morning when a hundred or so mostly middle-aged men and women blocked the sidewalk in front of the city courthouse and began to sing the Italian national anthem, "Fratelli d'Italia." All MPs and senators of former Premier Silvio Berlusconi's Freedom party (PdL), they were protesting what they consider the magistrates' persecution of their maximum leader. This new clash typifies the problems the country is addressing in its gravest political crisis in over a half century.
  • Facts & Stories
    Judith Harris(February 26, 2013)
    In a globalized world, the gigantic wave laps on distant shores, and never have Italian voters generated so much outside interest as during the two days of national general elections Feb. 24-25. For their part, Italian commentators have borrowed the phrase "Tsunami Tour", as actor-politician Beppe Grillo dubbed his campaign, as a larger metaphor for the stunning results.
  • 2013 to be the Year of Italian Culture in the United States, during which America will discover Italy and all its values: culture, arts, sciences, and advanced technologies. The aim of this yearlong journey is to communicate and promote Italy, and to create new, and reinforce the already longstanding bonds uniting Italy and the United States, by engaging Americans in numerous cultural activities taking place in major American cities throughout the year.
  • Facts & Stories
    E.M.(February 02, 2009)
    Three Italian youths viciously assaulted an Indian immigrant, setting him on fire as he slept. Today the men were collared while Italian politicians sounded out on the crime
  • Turin's annual Book Fair, Italy's largest, became the subject of political debate for the first time in its history when it honored Israeli writers this year. Demonstrations associated with pro-Palestinian groups preceded and lasted well into the event. Intellectuals from all sides of the ideological divide weighed in, while Italy's president, Giorgio Napolitano, was called to oversee the fair