The Times - UK (2020-08-01)

14 2GM Saturday August 1 2020 | the times

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Italy appeals

for tourists

past month. A migrant centre in the

town of Treviso, north of Venice, has

reported 133 positive cases among

293 residents.

The Maltese authorities on Tuesday

found about two thirds of a group of 94

migrants tested positive for the virus.

Mr Di Maio said that Italy was co-

operating with the government of

Tunisia, the point of origin for many

recent arrivals, to try to stem the flow.

Luciana Lamorgese, the Italian inte-

rior minister, visited Tunis on Monday

and agreed to strengthen the repatria-

tion mechanism between the two

countries.

“There will be twice-weekly flights to

repatriate Tunisians,” Mr Di Maio said.

“We will explain to people coming to

Italy from Tunisia that not only is

Tunisia a safe country but it is a country

with which we have a repatriation

agreement.

“Whoever arrives from there in Italy

does not have grounds to obtain a resi-

dency permit.”

Mr Di Maio said that Italy was also

urging Brussels to reactivate an EU mi-

grant redistribution system that was

halted by the pandemic. This would

help Italy with its repatriation efforts,

and provide economic aid to Tunisia.

“We have to face the fact that the mari-

time frontiers of Italy are the maritime

frontiers of the European Union,” he

said.

The situation in Libya, a country

racked by civil war and another jump-

ing-off point for Mediterranean mi-

grants, was even more complex, Mr Di

Maio acknowledged.

Italy’s co-operation with the Libyan

coastguard in blocking migrant boats

and returning their passengers to

atrocious conditions in refugee camps

has been a source of tension between

Five Star and its Democratic Party

allies. The Democrats were accusing

the government of complicity in

human rights abuses.

“In a country at war there is naturally

an issue of human rights,” Mr Di Maio

said. “But everything we do is to help

the Libyan people, to provide the mini-

mum conditions for the respect of

human rights.”

The minister said that about 800,

migrants were sheltering in Libya and

the Italian government was working

with United Nations agencies to en-

courage their voluntary repatriation.

About 80,000 people between Libya

and Niger had accepted the offer of

assistance, he said.

“We help people who reached Libya

thinking they had found Eldorado to

return home with some financial

support, which we are funding,” he said.

Mr Di Maio rejected suggestions that

Italy had been ineffectual in its dealings

with its former north African colony.

“It’s not just a Mediterranean problem,”

Mr Di Maio said. “It concerns a country

where the conflict risks an inter-

national escalation, as well as repre-

senting a serious threat of terrorism for

the European continent.”

Italian villas, Weekend

Philip Willan Rome

Paris v Marseilles: doctors in fight

Two of France’s most distinguished

medical figures are heading for a court-

room showdown in a dispute over whe-

ther Covid-19 patients have a better

chance of survival in Paris or Marseil-

les, where some have been treated with

a controversial antimalarial drug.

Didier Raoult, an infectious diseases

specialist at the Mi Institute in Marseil-

les in the south of France who champi-

oned hydroxychloroquine, told a par-

liamentary committee that his patients

were much more likely to survive than

those treated in the capital.

Martin Hirsch, 56, the director of the

Paris Hospital Authority, responded by

writing to the speaker of parliament to

accuse Professor Raoult, 68, of commit-

ting perjury under oath. The Marseilles

Adam Sage Paris doctor’s treatment is based on wide-

spread testing and the use of hydroxy-

chroloquine, a drug backed by Presi-

dent Trump and President Bolsonaro

of Brazil but dismissed as useless and

possibly harmful by most scientific

studies.

Now Professor Raoult, who is regu-

larly consulted by President Macron,

has hit back, denying the perjury alle-

gation and announcing that he had

begun a lawsuit against Mr Hirsch

for libel.

Mr Hirsch’s supporters say that

the libel trial will illustrate the

weakness of Professor Raoult’s

claims.

The row, against a backdrop of

worrying signs of an increase in

cases in France, with ten new

suspected clusters, is about more

Martin Hirsch, right, disputes claims

by Didier Raoult that patients have a

better chance of survival in Marseilles

British tourists should not be afraid of
coming to Italy, the country’s foreign
minister said yesterday, despite fears
that a second wave of Covid-19 infec-
tions is beginning in western Europe.
“Italy has lived through one of the
most difficult moments of its history,”
Luigi Di Maio told The Times. “But
thanks to our doctors and experts and
the great sense of responsibility shown
by all our citizens during the lockdown,
Italy is up and running again.”
Mr Di Maio, 34, an influential
member of the anti-establishment Five
Star Movement, has served as foreign
minister in an uneasy alliance with the
centre-left Democratic Party since
September last year. “Britons who de-
cide to spend their holiday in Italy will
find not just the beautiful country that
we all know but the enthusiasm and
energy of a people who are getting
going again after living through a
dramatic period,” Mr Di Maio said.
Italy was the first country in Europe
to be engulfed by the coronavirus pan-
demic. Some of its hospitals in the
wealthy north were overwhelmed by
patients. Coffins were transported in
convoys of army lorries from Bergamo,
one of the hardest hit cities, northeast

of Milan, after local funeral services
were swamped.
Disciplined adherence to a strict
lockdown and respect for rules on face
coverings and social distancing have
brought down the infection rate, with
recent new cases usually under 300 and
deaths often in single figures.
“British citizens visiting Italy will find
a safe country because the epidemio-
logical situation is under control,” Mr
Di Maio said. The country had quadru-
pled the number of intensive care beds
available in hospitals, he said.
Tourists could use normal transport
and would be required to respect rules
on masks and social distancing, in force
under a state of emergency extended
until October. They were also likely to
have their temperature read, often on
arriving at a hotel or at the beach.
“All measures are in place, not to
guarantee safe corridors but a safe
country,” Mr Di Maio said. In the south,
however, the arrival of more than 6,
migrants in small boats from north
Africa over the past month has
swamped reception facilities.
Mass breakouts from quarantine
centres have alarmed the local people
and threatened to deter holidaymakers.
Four migrants recently tested posi-
tive to Covid-19 in Lampedusa’s over-
crowded reception facility and at least
99 refugees have been found to be posi-
tive among those who arrived over the

Luigi Di Maio said

that visitors would

find Italy was safe

india

India has decided to reopen gyms

and yoga studios and lift a

nighttime curfew in place since

March, despite another record

surge in coronavirus cases and a

death toll higher than Italy’s.

More than 55,000 new cases and

779 deaths were recorded in the

past 24 hours, bringing India’s total

to about 1.63 million infections and

35,747 fatalities. However, the

Indian government confirmed it

would press ahead with easing

restrictions. In Delhi, hotels that

have been kept on standby for use

as quarantine facilities or

coronavirus wards will be allowed

to reopen for business.

japan

Tokyo may have to be placed under

a state of emergency again if

coronavirus infections continue to

rise to record levels, the city’s

governor has warned.

Yuriko Koike said that from

Monday karaoke parlours and

businesses serving alcohol will be

asked to close at 10pm. Tokyo

announced 463 new infections

yesterday, a 25 per cent increase on

the record of 367 set last week.

south africa

Bandile Masuku, one of South

Africa’s senior health ministers, has

been forced to step down along with

his wife, an official with the city of

Johannesburg, over allegations of

corruption linked to a £6 million

tender for pandemic supplies.

There is growing public anger

over lucrative contracts linked to

the political elite. President

Ramaphosa announced a special

unit would look into wrongdoing.

Mr Ramaphosa’s spokeswoman,

Khusela Diko, has also been placed

on immediate leave after reports

emerged that her husband’s

company was irregularly awarded

PPE contracts in Gauteng.

India opens

gyms and

yoga studios

despite surge

Masks can be plain, as

seen at Bali airport,

high-tech, as shown

by the Colombian

designer Ricardo

Conde, or fashionable,

like James Maina

Mwangi’s — he has

one to match all of his

160 suits

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