ANSA.The Vatican has shelved plans to put up a statue to Galileo Galilei, the Italian astronomer famously forced to recant his discovery that the earth moves around the sun. (Read the article )

THE SPECTATOR. The number of American visitors to Italy has fallen about 20 percent in the past year, according to tourism agencies. That is a painful slide for a country that saw American tourism shrivel after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States and never fully rebound.
(Read the article )

ANSA. A charity founded by the U2 vocalist Bono is set to inject a dose of Hollywood glamour into the Sanremo Festival (Read the article )

From Boston.com. The state's first Italian-American speaker, who will be replaced by fellow-ethnic Robert A. DeLeo, has a long record of legislative achievements. According to The Boston Globe DeMasi "was instrumental in crafting Massachusetts's healthcare reform legislation, which advocates have hailed as a national model. He also helped kill a 2007 referendum to defeat gay marriage and orchestrated the failure of Governor Deval Patrick’s plan to license three resort casinos." However, the paper continues, DiMasi's long political career

"may ultimately be marred by the ethical questions that triggered multiple investigations and may have prompted his resignation. His friend and former accountant, Richard Vitale, was accused last month by Attorney General Martha Coakley of using his influence with DiMasi to push for a bill that would benefit his client, the Massachusetts Association of Ticket Brokers."

From NowPublic. Just days after Pope Benedict XVI welcomed four controversial priests, excommunicated in the 1980's for denying the Jewish holocaust, back to the Catholic church another priest has made shocking comments about Nazi extermination of the Jews during WWII.

Claiming that the gas chambers existed to "disinfect" and not to kill, Father Floriano Abrahamowicz drummed up controversy and directed more criticism toward the Vatican for reinstating holocaust denier Bishop Richard Williamson and 3 other controversial excommunicated priests.