The Local

Italian police on Tuesday arrested two men in Milan on terrorism charges, accused of helping finance the Islamic State (IS) group and spreading propaganda online. ...

People hold portraits of murdered Slovak joualist Jan Kuciak and his girlfriend Martina Kusnirova during a silent protest march in their memory on Friday in Bratislava, Slovakia. PHOTO: ALEX HALADA Slovak police on Saturday said they had released seven Italian businessmen detained after they were named by murdered joualist Jan Kuciak in an explosive...

A newspaper kiosk in Milan. Photo: Jose Luis Hidalgo R/Flickr An Italian newspaper editor has been acquitted of wrongdoing over a headline printed after the 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris, which labelled the killers 'Islamic bastards'. Maurizio Belpietropublished the headline on the front page of centre-right Italian daily Libero the moing after the attacks in which 130 people were killed, including one Italian. A court in Milan, where the publication is based, has now acquitted the editor of insulting a religious belief, aggravated by racial hatred, under article 403 of the Italian criminal code. If found guilty, Belpietro could have faced a fine of thousands of euros. ...

Italy's Court of Cassation. Photo: Tiziana Fabi/AFP Clicking 'like' on a terrorist video on Facebook counts as evidence of apology for terrorism, Italy's top court has ruled. Taken alongside other evidence, a Facebook like can be a "serious indication of guilt and therefore justifies pre-trial detention in jail", the Court of Cassation ruled. The judgment related to a Kosovan man resident in Fiesse in the Brescia area, who was expelled from Italy in November 2016 on charges of online propaganda. He had lived in the country for around ten years and at the time of his expulsion, the Interior Ministry said, the man's Facebook page "contained documents and files of jih...

A makeshift memorial at Marseille train station. Photo: Boris Horvat/AFP Tunisian men who carried out attacks in France and Germany both spent time in a region near Rome, officials said on Wednesday, sparking fears in Italy of a jihadist den near the capital. The Aprilia region "has been under surveillance for a long time due to several cases of presumed jihadist sympathizers," Rome prose...

Concrete barriers in one of Milan's busiest streets. Photo: Miguel Medina/AFPItaly is tuing to green solutions in order to protect its public spaces against potential attacks, without having a negative impact on the appearance of squares and other popular sites. Italian architect Stefano Boeri last week suggested that authorities use oak trees and flower pots at major sites to limit the impact o...

Renowned Italian architect Stefano Boeri has argued that public spaces should be redesigned to include natural barriers such as giant plants to protect pedestrians from possible terror attacks. Boeri is the brain behind the sustainable residential building projectVertical Forests, the first of which was built in Milan, hosting thousands of trees and plants on a tower block. He has championed the idea of incorporating greenery into urban plaing to tackle problems caused by urbanization, including air pollution, and a larger green 'city'will be built near the Chinese city of Liuzhou in the n...

People bring candles and flowers to the makeshift memorial for the victims of the stabbings at the Turku Market Square, Finland on August 20, 2017. Photo: Vesa Moilanen/Lehtikuva/AFPAn Italian woman who was stabbed in a terror atack in the southe Fiish town of Turku is in a stable condition, according to reports. Lisa Biancucci, 34, was pushing her six-month-old daughter in a pram down the street when the attacker stabbed her in the shoulder, according to Repubblica. Her daughter was unharmed, according to several reports. Italy's ministry of foreign affairs confirmed that an Italian was ...

An Isis group poster in the central Syrian town of Al-Sukhnah in August 2017. File photo: Stringer/AFPItaly on Saturday aounced the deportation of two Moroccans and a Syrian suspected of Islamist extremist sympathies, lifting to 202 the number of such orders since January 2015. Such expulsion orders, with no option for appeal, are one of the main planks of Italy's strategy for preventing the kind of jihadist attacks suffered by other European countries. The latest suspects to be kicked out included a 38-year-old Moroccan who was said to have been radicalised while in prison for minor crim...

Two Italians were reportedly among the 13 killed by the van attack in Barcelona on Thursday afteoon according to multiple media reports citing foreign office sources. At least three more Italians have been reported injured in a night that saw three terrorist incidents on Spain's east coast. One of the deceased victims was Italian marketing manager Bruno Gulotta, who was killed in the attack on Las Ramblas after a man drove a van into pedestrians on the busy street. Gulotta, a 35-year-old, was on holiday in Barcelona with his wife and two children, according to a statement from Tom's Hardware...

Ethan Hawke stars in 'First Reformed'. Photo: Angela Weiss/AFPThe oldest film festival in the world is going big on nail-biters this year with thrillers dominating the race for Venice's coveted Golden Lion award, organisers said on Thursday. Stars George Clooney, Matt Damon, Michelle Pfeiffer, Rober...

File photo of British singer Morrissey during his concert in the Citibanamex arena in Monterrey Nuevo Leon. Photo: Julio Cesar Aguilar/AFPAlteative rock icon Morrissey said on Wednesday that he was "terrorized" by a police officer in Rome who held him at gunpoint for half an hour on a busy street....

File photo of police on patrol outside Milan's cathedral. Photo: Olivier Morin/AFP Milan prosecutors have opened a terrorism probe into the man who stabbed two soldiers and a police officer on Thursday evening, according to Italian media reports....

Pope Francis greets Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, leader of the world's Anglicans. Photo: Alessandra Tarantino/AFPPope Francis on Tuesday denounced those who wage war in the name of God, as he met faith leaders and victims of war in Assisi to discuss growing religious fanaticism and escalating violence around the world. "The world is at war, the world is suffering," the Argentine said ahead of the meeting, which came as fighting resumed in Syria and the US investigated an attack possibly linked to the Islamic State group. "There is no God of war," he said, calling on "all men and women of good will, of any religion, to pray for peace". The aual World Day of Prayer event, establish...

Venice's Palazzo del Cinema, home of the city's film festival. Photo: AFPGun cartridges and 'anarchic' messages written on toilet paper caused panic at Venice's Palazzo del Cinema, where the city's film festival is taking place. Security forces and a bomb squad were called in after two men alerted them to the disturbing display in the bathroom of the 1930's cinema last weekend, local media reported. The messages displayed around the two cartridges included references to the recent Charlie Hebdo cartoon which likened victims of the central Italian earthquake to lasagne, along with the phrase 'Everyone has their own reasons'. These notes were accompanied by signature that allowed police to tra...

Italian police officers on patrol at Rome's Fiumicino airport earlier this year. Photo: AFPInterior Minister Angelino Alfano waed on Monday that while Italy is working hard to prevent attacks, there is "no such thing as zero risk". "Security is a national priority," he said. "Our resources have grown over the last three years, and ours has been a safe country until now, in a context where there is no such thing as 'zero risk'." He praised the "enormous effort" of the police forces and added that the fact Italy had not been hit by the kind of terrorist attacks which have been seen in France, Germany and Belgium "is not just down to luck". He added that Italian police work 24-hours-a-day to pr...

Security has been upped at key sites in Rome amid a heightened terror threat. Photo: Andreas Solaro/AFPSecurity has been upped at the Colosseum and the Vatican as part of new anti-terrorism measures, and amid persistent threats from the Isis extremist group. Rome police chief Nicolò D'Angelo said there would be the highest level of security around the Colosseum, with police positioned at public entrance points, as well as the nearby Via del Corso, Rome’s main shopping thoroughfare. There will also be maximum security in the area surrounding St Peter’s, including the Vatican Museums, as well as at various churches and places of worship within the centre and in Rome’s outskirts. Security will ...

A Pakistani man expelled from Italy for allegedly plotting an attack in the name of the Isis group used to captain the Italian youth cricket team, media reports said on Wednesday. Aftab Farook was caught on a wire-tap talking about using a Kalashnikov orbomb to attack targets such as a wine shop in Milan or the airport of Bergamoin northe Italy, saying the important thing was to scare Europeans, Italiannewspapers reported. On Tuesday, Interior Minister Angelino Alfano said the 26-year-oldsupported Isis and was plaing to go to Syria to join militants. The news stued locals in Vaprio d'Adda near Milan, where Farook had livedwith his family since he was 13 years old. Photos published in 2009 by...

Interior Minister Angelino Alfano said Italy would continue to take a hard-line approach against terrorism. Photo: Andreas SolaroA 29-year-old man was deported on Monday on charges of being an aspiring fighter for the Isis extremist group. Farook Aftab, a warehouse worker from Pakistan, allegedly plaed to carry out an attack on a wine shop in the name of Islam, Ansa reported. Italy’s anti-terrorism police, Digos, found evidence that he had swo allegiance to the group via an online video and accessed terrorist propaganda online. Aftab, who arrived in Italy in 2003 and had his citizenship request tued down earlier this year, is also alleged to have tried to recruit his wife to Isis, Ansa said....

Italy's Interiror Minister, Angelino Alfano. Photo: Alberto Pizzoli/AFPItaly's Interior Minister Angelino Alfano on Thursday told Parliament that 35 Islamists had been expelled from the country so far in 2016. "Since January 1st, 2015, we have expelled 106 people, carried out checks on 106,000 terrorists, arrested 549 and placed 884 under investigation," Alfano added. Of those expelled “all were found to be working to radicalize others and promote jihad in Italy,” Alfano said.Speaking to just 20 MPs present in Italy's Parliament, the minister aounced the latest two expulsions had occoured on Wednesday, Il Fatto Quotidiano reported. The two most recently expelled were both Moroccan nationals:...