Day-trippers will have to pay €5 to visit Italian city under scheme designed to protect it from excess tourism

Authorities in Venice have been accused of transforming the famous lagoon city into a “theme park” as a long-mooted entrance fee for day trippers comes into force.

Venice is the first major city in the world to enact such a scheme. The €5 (£4.30) charge, which comes into force today, is aimed at protecting the Unesco world heritage site from the effects of excessive tourism by deterring day trippers and, according to the mayor, Luigi Brugnaro, making the city “livable” again.

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Home secretary visits Lampedusa in Italy as National Audit Office says scheme could surpass £580m by 2030

Several flights a month will deport asylum seekers to Rwanda “indefinitely”, the home secretary has said, as he argued that the £1.8m a person cost of the scheme was justified.

James Cleverly, in his first interview since the government’s plan was approved by parliament on Monday, said he had booked a succession of initial flights and was preparing to order the detention of people seeking refuge in the UK so they could be sent to east Africa.

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Investigation urged into alleged bid to turn Rai into propaganda channel for ruling parties before elections

The European commission has been urged to investigate alleged attempts by Italy’s far-right government to turn the public broadcaster, Rai, into a “megaphone” for the ruling parties ahead of the European elections.

The appeal from the European Green party came after the Italian parliament’s supervisory committee for Rai approved a measure allowing the broadcaster’s news channel to televise political rallies in full and without any journalistic mediation in the run-up to the vote in early June.

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Health, jobs, defence, security and climate crisis all seen as more important than immigration with June elections approaching

Irregular migration is not the top priority for European voters despite the prominence of the issue in the media and political campaigning by rightwing parties over the last year, a new survey commissioned by the European parliament shows.

The Eurobarometer poll which tracks public opinions every quarter puts poverty and the cost of living crisis and social exclusion as the number one issue for voters who go to the polls in early June to elect a new European parliament.

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Opposition parties say women’s rights dealt blow after package approved by Georgia Meloni’s cabinet

Italian opposition parties have said women’s rights in Italy have been dealt a “heavy” blow after parliament passed a measure by Giorgia Meloni’s far-right government allowing anti-abortion activists to enter abortion consultation clinics.

The measure forms part of a package of initiatives approved by Meloni’s cabinet that will be funded by the EU’s post-pandemic recovery fund, of which Italy is the biggest beneficiary, and was put to the lower house in a confidence vote on Tuesday. The package of measures is expected to comfortably pass in the senate, too.

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Founder of Black Audio Film Collective says he would have laughed if someone had said he’d someday be in the UK pavilion

Britain’s national pavilion at the Venice Biennale, the world’s largest and most prominent art event, begins with video of delicate Holbein drawings from the Tudor court being washed over by the eddies of a stream and ends with the death of a British-Nigerian man, David Oluwale, who drowned in a Yorkshire river after being beaten by local police in 1969.

Along the way, in filmmaker Sir John Akomfrah’s exhibition, comes a sumptuously told visual and auditory story of migration and colonialism, held together by the image of flowing water. It culminates in images of the arrival in Britain of the Windrush generation – those who migrated from the Caribbean to the UK in the years after the second world war, often to work in British public services.

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Owner of Al Condominio in Verona says response to the initiative during meals has been very positive

An Italian restaurant is offering a free bottle of wine to customers who relinquish their mobile phones during meals.

Angelo Lella, the owner of Al Condominio, a restaurant that opened in the northern city of Verona in March, said the aim was to revive the conviviality of an eatery in which diners chat to each other as opposed to constantly glancing at their phones.

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Netflix hit series based on Patricia Highsmith novel brings prospect of surge in visitors to Atrani area of Amalfi coast

When Andrew Scott’s eponymous character in the hit new Netflix series Ripley travels from Naples to the village of Atrani, the rickety bus has the road almost to itself; a solitary Vespa passes going the other way. When he tracks down Dickie Greenleaf at the beach, the rich American and his girlfriend are the only people sunbathing on the pristine sands.

Visitors to the Amalfi coast today will note the contrast. Unlike in 1961, the road between Positano and Salerno is now known as much for its traffic jams as for the views. Atrani may be less busy than its neighbour Amalfi, but in summer its beach is taken over by rows of umbrellas and sunbeds. A small area, perhaps a fifth of the space, is public spiaggia libera .

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‘Black room’ with frescoes inspired by Trojan war described as one of most striking discoveries ever made at site in southern Italy

A banquet room replete with well preserved frescoes depicting characters inspired by the Trojan war has been unearthed among the ruins of Pompeii in what has been described as one of the most striking discoveries ever made at the archaeological site in southern Italy.

The 15-metre-long, six-metre-wide room was found in a former private residence in Via di Nola, which was ancient Pompeii’s longest road, during excavations in the Regio IX area of the site.

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