Transatlantico

During the March 15 Democratic presidential debate between Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders, moderator Jake Tapper of CNN asked how to avoid a situation like that in Italy, where in some areas doctors are forced to decide who gets urgent treatment and who does not to survive the coronavirus. When it was Biden’s turn to […]

(Travelers are screened at the airport in Bologna) – by Andrew Spannaus – Three weeks have passed since the first restrictions were announced in Northern Italy to combat the spread of the novel coronavirus; three weeks in which things have gotten much worse, quickly, making Italy the second hardest-hit country in the world at this […]

- by Andrew Spannaus – A meeting with Russians, allegations of corruption, and a call for a leading politician to resign.  Russiagate has come to Italy. A representative of the League — the right-wing anti-establishment party now part of the country’s governing coalition — is alleged to have floated a scheme for his party to receive […]

Italy caused a political firestorm in mid-March when it announced that it would be joining China’s Belt and Road Initiative by signing a memorandum of understanding during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Rome from March 21 to 23. As the first G-7 country to accept a formal agreement to participate in the initiative, also […]

Yellow Vests, Italian Budget Battles & Silent Labor Unions By Andrew Spannaus in Milan Special to Consortium News From the European Union’s standpoint, the historic levels of social unrest confronting French President Emmanuel Macron, one of its leading champions, came at a delicate moment in its dealings with Italy. Since mid-September, the European Commission, the EU’s executive body, […]

The Italian government of Giuseppe Conte, whose EU-critical policies are driven by the leaders of the two coalition partners, and Deputy Prime Ministers, Luigi Di Maio of the Five Star Movement (M5S) and Matteo Salvini of the League, has decided to openly challenge EU budget rules. When in mid-September Economics Minister Giovanni Tria initially set […]

During the 2016 United States election campaign, most of Italy’s political class and media adopted the standard line about how Donald Trump was a grave threat to the stability of the Western world. Unlike previous Italian governments, which toed the pro-globalization line, the new government in Rome, supported by the anti-system Five Star Movement and the right-wingLeague, seems […]

Orders for Italian machine tools jumped in the third quarter of 2017, seeing an increase of 14.7% compared to the same period last year. The data published by the Research and Business Culture Center of UCIMU, the Italian machine tools, robots and automation manufacturers’ association, show the excellent performance of the internal market, +68.2% compared […]

Poverty levels in Italy remain significant, but essentially unchanged in recent years, after the rapid rise starting 2010 following the international financial crisis and the Euro crisis in particular. In its “Discussion Note” for September 2017, the Prometeia research association stresses that in Italy the categories “at risk of poverty” and “working poor” are above […]

- by Andrew Spannaus – European nations have been thrown into a political crisis by the hundreds of thousands of migrants coming north from the Middle East and Africa. The number has grown in recent years, due to a mix of wars and poverty, resulting in a visible increase of the influx of foreigners across […]