Italy's government said on Wednesday it had approved new measures to beef up online security and protect critical infrastructure from increasing cyber assaults.Attacks on computer security have risen significantly in recent years, the government said, citing data from the information technology organization Assinform indicating that 40 percent of attacks take at least four days to resolve.

Inside a midnight-blue BMW, a Sicilian entrepreneur delivered his pitch to the accused mafia boss. A new business was blowing into Italy that could spin wind and sunlight into gold, ensuring the future of the Earth as well as the Cosa Nostra: renewable energy.

Mario Monti said Wednesday that sacrifices his technocrat government imposed on Italians had "improved conditions" not only in their own country but across Europe. Mr. Monti, who resigned as prime minister last month and is competing in next month's general election, said Italian politicians in the past often "promised illusions" that in practice meant "ending up with taxes, and debt, and sovereign debt crises."

 Food and wine may already be an embedded focus of vacation plans for many travelers. It's not something to put on a to-do list, pencil in on an itinerary or even think all that much about when traveling. But maybe it should be. Travel companies feature and package food and wine bike tours in sizes that fit just about anyone and in 2013, there are plenty of them.

 Fabrizio Corona, Italy’s most famous paparazzo, reportedly emerged in the Dominican Republic on Tuesday, after a Europe-wide arrest warrant was issued for him.

Instead of following international standards on how to treat asylum seekers and unaccompanied migrant children who arrive illegally from Greece, the Italian authorities have been summarily returning them, according to a report by Human Rights Watch scheduled to be published Tuesday. 

Judges hearing ex-Premier Silvio Berlusconi's sex-for-hire trial on Monday pushed back the verdict and the sentencing in the case until after Italy's Feb. 24-25 national election. Prosecutors, meanwhile, pressed to make sure they can give their closing arguments, which include their sentencing demands, before the vote, in which Berlusconi is heading a center-right coalition. 

Though President Obama actually took the oath of office on Jan. 20, public inaugural celebrations take place on Jan. 21, the same day that Martin Luther King will be celebrated this year. In honor of both of these occasions, this will be our only post on Monday. Below, some resources for teaching and learning about each. 

The European Union said Monday that Erasmus students must not face discrimination but should be allowed to vote in next month's general elections in Italy. Erasmus students from Italy, who are studying outside the country through the EU exchange program, should not be discriminated against, said a spokesman for the EU Commissioner for Education and Culture Androulla Vassiliou.