WorldcrunchNiccolò Zancan is a special correspondent for the Italian newspaper La Stampa.
In Dronero, the overwhelming majority of students enrolled in primary schools are of foreign descent, while the children of Italian parents go to school in neighboring villages. Some point to racism to explain the phenomenon, but the reality is a different one.
Years of budget cuts and a sluggish economy have pushed Italy’s public healthcare system to the brink. As doctors and nurses flee the country in search of better pay, it is in communities along the border with Switzerland where the cracks are most visible.
In the next few days, the first migrants to land in Italy will be transferred to the controversial new overseas migrant detention centers on Albanian soil. Human rights organizations warn of the way migrants to be treated fairly in them.
A video has emerged of nine young Eritrean women being whipped with a heavy belt by a truck driver on the Italian side of the Italy-France border, exposing a pattern of violent trafficking that migrants face transiting through Italy trying to get to France.
In Trieste, on Italy’s northeastern border, more than 400 migrants have been living without food, among rats and garbage — and in a political quagmire — as they wait for responses to their asylum applications.