ANSA. Italy was the first EU country to follow Israel, Canada and the United States by withdrawing Thursday from the Durban Review Conference, a follow-up to the 2001 World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance. Critics say both the original 2001 conference in Durban and preparatory meetings for the 2009 meeting undermined UN principles because of open anti-Israel sentiment, and other countries are also considering a boycott. (Read the Article)
 

ART DAILY. Malcolm Rogers, Ann and Graham Gund Director of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), was honored with a special recognition from the President of the Republic of Italy, Giorgio Napolitano. A medal was presented by the Italian Ambassador to the USA, His Excellency Giovanni Castellaneta, at a ceremony at the MFA. The award is the Commendatore al Merito della Repubblica Italiana (Commander of the Order to the Merit of the Italian Republic), one of the highest honors presented by the President of the Italian Republic. It was accorded to Rogers on the occasion of the opening of the MFA exhibition, Titian, Tintoretto, Veronese: Rivals in Renaissance Venice. The exhibition, which includes 13 masterpieces lent by Italy, is presented under the High Patronage of the President of the Italian Republic. (Read the Article)
 

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS. One hundred years ago the terrorists of that time were called the Black Hand, ruthless gangsters who preyed on Italian-American immigrants, and Lt. Giuseppe (Joseph) Petrosino was dispatched to Sicily on an intelligence-gathering mission. Petrosino was ambushed by gunmen near a statue of Garibaldi in downtown Palermo. Thursday will mark the 100th anniversary of Petrosino's assassination, the only cop murdered overseas in the department's history. (Read the Article by John Marzulli)

THE WEEK. It all began in the spring of 1968, when a largely unknown writer named Mario Puzo walked into the office of Robert Evans, the head of production at Paramount Pictures. Puzo had a big cigar and a belly to match, and the all-powerful Evans had consented to take a meeting with this nobody from New York only as a favor to a friend. Under the writer’s arm was a rumpled envelope containing 50 or 60 pages of typescript, which he desperately needed to use as collateral for cash." I’ll give you 10 G’s for it as an option against $75,000 if it becomes a book,” Evans said, more out of pity than excitement.  A few months later, when Puzo called and asked, “Would I be in breach of contract if I change the name of the book? I want to call it The Godfather.”

 

NY DAILY NEWS. The Brownstone Brooklyn neighborhood that was once an Italian stronghold is quickly becoming the city's Little Paris - fueled by a new French program at a local public school.  "I have a lot of French customers coming in," said Frank Caputo of Caputo's Fine Foods, a venerable Italian specialty store on Court St. opened by his parents 36 years ago. "In the last two or three years, it's doubled." Along with prosciutto, mortadella and other Italian favorites, Caputo stocks lots of different French cheeses, "When they order French cheese, they pronounce it the right way," he said. "They do eat a lot of cheese." (Read the Article by Elizabeth Hays)