NAPLES, Italy (AFP) — Italy's president condemned Sunday the growing mountains of garbage piling up on the streets of Naples as a "tragedy" that must be resolved, the day before a crisis cabinet meeting.
Due to recurring problems at waste treatment centres, an estimated 100,000 tonnes of rubbish has gathered in the southern city and its surrounding regions, including 4,500 in Naples alone, according to ANSA news agency.
President Giorgio Napolitano, a native of the city, told journalists that the problem "has become a real tragedy" which "must be solved".
Rain has stopped the garbage from smelling too bad, although the streets of Naples are littered with overflowing dumpsters and rubbish bags.
"This problem is an offence against human dignity, (it) is a major scar on our territory and stalls our economic development," said Gennaro Pascarella, the bishop of Pozzuoli, a city west of Naples, in a message read at masses across the region.
Prime Minister Romano Prodi said late Saturday the government would take steps to reach a definitive solution to the problem, which dates back more than a decade. The cabinet is due to hold a crisis meeting on the problem Monday.
Prodi also ordered schools in Naples to re-open Monday as planned, despite objections from local mayors concerned about hygiene, saying "the environment is the same, whether at home or at school."
Defence Minister Arturo Parisi said in a statement Sunday that the army was willing to lend vehicles to local authorities to help dispose of garbage piled up near schools, according to the ANSA.
Problems disposing of Naples' garbage are nothing new. Overloaded treatment centres have reached the tipping point several times since 1994, and the problem is exacerbated by the local Camorra mafia.
Criminal investigators say they pay truckers to haul industrial waste from factories in northern Italy for fees that undercut those of the legal trade. They bring it to illegal dumps in the Naples region made by blasting holes in mountainsides.
Some centres had been closed in the past trying to clamp down on the illegal trade. Three were re-opened in May but remain full, and the region's first new incinerator is not due to open until 2009.
Naples authorities were due to reopen a condemned dump in the western Pianura suburb, but demonstrators concerned about pollution blocked an access route there in protest last week and clashed with police over the weekend.
A Naples police spokesman said the situation at the site -- where four buses had also been torched Friday night -- was "calm" overnight.
The European Union opened an inquiry against Italy in June because of the piles of garbage in the Naples area which it said violated European refuse legislation.
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