ALGHERO, Sardinia-The local cuisine of the city combines Sardinian traditions with a Catalan influence and a focus on seafood and local vegetables, especially artichokes. From famous French tire company-recommended restaurants on their way to a starry future, to the local sandwich shop at the port, Alghero has a lot to satisfy the palate of any visitor.
Darcie Peters
PADUA -- In its appointment of Riccardo Nocini, aged 33, as a full Professor, the University of Verona has found itself embroiled in a media scandal amid alleged questionable hiring practices an
28 Dec 2025
Michael LaPointe
MATERA-Over 20 years ago, my wife told me about a new cave hotel in Matera. I thought she was crazy - why would anyone pay money to sleep inside of a cave? The hotel, Sextantio Le Grotte della Civita shattered this conception, combing luxury with historic authenticity, thereby providing a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
23 Dec 2025
Darcie Peters
MILAN -- Italian cuisine has been officially recognised on UNESCO’s Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, a milestone hailed by ministers as a landmark achievement for Italian culinary and tourist industries but the accolade obscures the lot of five million impoverished Italians dependent on hand-outs to meet their food needs..
22 Dec 2025
INSIDER NEWSDESK
BRUSSELS – The European Ombudsman, Teresa Anjinho, has opened an inquiry into a complaint by David Petrie, the head of the association of foreign university lecturers in Italy, over the Commission’s bizarre decision to accept at face value the Italian Government’s mendacious claims to have compensated all foreign lecturers who have suffered discrimination in corrupt Italian universities, Ms Anjinho said.
22 Dec 2025
INSIDER NEWSDESK
ROME -- Concerns about political favoritism have resurfaced at the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), with critics now pointing to what they describe as a broader pattern of discretionary senior staffing decisions under the current Director-General, Qu Dongyu, a member of the Chinese Communist Party, that they argue undermines established UN standards.
22 Dec 2025
Insider reporters
ROME – Byzantine efforts by the wily FAO Human Resources director Serge Nakouzi eveidnelty designed to keep a West African poverty-buster in a series of high paid temporary jobs with the UN agency have bewildered regional stakeholders and partners, FAO sources claim.
19 Dec 2025
JAN FILIPOWICZ
ROME – The latest report of the Ombudsman at the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, due to be published in July, still has not been released, evidently because Chinese Director General Qu Dongyu decided to suppress its conclusions of “systemic failure” at the troubled UN poverty-busting agency, diplomatic sources said.
17 Dec 2025
JAN FILIPOWICZ
ROME – Cultural quango ICCROM’s General Assembly this month rejected budget proposals by beleaguered Director General Aruna Gujral and exposed a collapse of confidence in her leadership — through recorded votes, open opposition by major donors, procedural defeat, “and a form of institutional backtracking that no amount of spin can disguise,” diplomatic sources say.
17 Dec 2025