Italy on Monday declared a state of emergency for areas surrounding the river Po, which accounts for roughly a third of the country’s agricultural production and is suffering its worst drought for 70 years.
The government decree will allow authorities to cut through red tape and take action immediately if they think it necessary, such as to impose water rationing for homes and businesses, Reuters reported.
The Po is Italy’s longest river which runs for more than 400 miles through the wealthy north of Italy. Its waters help irrigate rice paddies, farm fields and grazing land for cows, including some whose milk is used to make prized Parmigiano Reggiano cheese.
However, many stretches of the waterway have run dry and farmers say the flow is so weak that sea water is seeping inland, destroying crops.
The government said in a statement that the emergency measures would cover lands that bordered the Po and the water basins of the eastern Alps.
More broadly, it also introduced a state of emergency in five northern regions – Emilia-Romagna, Friuli Venezia Giulia, Lombardy, Piedmont and Veneto – earmarking an initial 36.5 million euros ($38 million) of funds to help them tackle the water shortage.
“The state of emergency is aimed at managing the current situation with extraordinary means and powers, with relief and assistance to the affected population,” the government said.
It added that further measures could be taken in future to deal with the drought which water authorities say is increasingly impacting central Italy after an extremely dry winter and spring followed by an exceptionally hot early summer.
Italian media have reported that Prime Minister Mario Draghi was also considering appointing a commissioner to coordinate the drought response, in a similar way to which the government created a commissioner to oversee the coronavirus crisis.
 

Police arrested a suspect Monday after a mass shooting left six dead at a US Independence Day parade in a wealthy Chicago suburb, casting a dark shadow over the country’s most patriotic holiday.
Robert Crimo, 22, was identified as a “person of interest” and became the target of a massive manhunt across the town of Highland Park in Illinois, where a rooftop gunman with a high-powered rifle turned a family-focused July 4 parade celebration into a scene of death and trauma, according to AFP.
Firing into the holiday crowd, the shooter caused scenes of chaos as panicked onlookers ran for their lives, leaving behind a parade route strewn with chairs, abandoned balloons and personal belongings.
Emergency officials said around two dozen people, including children, were treated for gunshot injuries, with some in critical condition.
After a brief car chase, Crimo was taken into custody “without incident,” Highland Park police chief Lou Jogmen told reporters.
The shooting is part of a wave of gun violence plaguing the United States, where approximately 40,000 deaths a year are caused by firearms, according to the Gun Violence Archive website.
In another July 4 shooting, two police officers were wounded when they came under fire during a fireworks display in Philadelphia, local officials said.
President Joe Biden voiced his shock and vowed to keep fighting “the epidemic of gun violence” sweeping the country.
Last week, Biden signed the first significant federal bill on gun safety in decades, just days after the Supreme Court ruled that Americans have a fundamental right to carry a handgun in public.
According to the Gun Violence Archive, there have been 311 mass shootings carried out in the US so far in 2022 – including at least five other incidents on July 4.
 

NATO’s 30 allies signed an accession protocol for Finland and Sweden on Tuesday, allowing them to join the nuclear-armed alliance once parliaments ratify the decision, the most significant expansion of the alliance since the 1990s.
The signing at NATO headquarters follows a deal with Turkey at last week’s NATO summit in Madrid, where Ankara lifted its veto on the Nordic membership bids following assurances that both countries would do more to fight terrorism, Reuters reported.
“This is truly a historic moment,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said alongside the foreign ministers of the two countries. “With 32 nations around the table, we will be even stronger.”
The protocol means Helsinki and Stockholm can participate in NATO meetings and have greater access to intelligence but will not be protected by the NATO defence clause – that an attack on one ally is an attack against all – until ratification. That is likely to take up to a year.
It was at an allied summit in Madrid in 1997 that Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic were invited to join, in the first of several waves of NATO’s eastern expansion – seen as an achievement for the West but which has angered Russia.
Moscow has repeatedly warned both countries against joining NATO. On March 12, the Russian Foreign Ministry said “there will be serious military and political consequences”.
Stoltenberg urged allies to swiftly ratify and assured the two Nordic countries of NATO’s support in the meantime.


 

Russia demanded an unconditional cessation of Israeli strikes on Syria, saying they are unacceptable.  
Israel launched an “air aggression” from the Mediterranean, west of Lebanon’s second city Tripoli on Saturday, with several missiles targeting an area to the south of Syria’s port city of Tartus, Press TV reported.
The attack was the first since new Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid took office ahead of a Nov. 1 election.
“We strongly condemn such irresponsible actions that violate the sovereignty of Syria and the basic norms of international law, and we demand their unconditional cessation,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
The Syrian Ministry of Defense said the strikes injured two civilians and caused some material damage.
Israel has staged hundreds of strikes in Syria over the years but rarely acknowledges or discusses such operations. Analysts say the attacks are a knee-jerk effort by the regime to prop up terrorist groups which are on their last legs in the Arab country.
Quoting a military source, Syria’s state news agency SANA said the missiles were launched Saturday by Israeli fighter jets over the Mediterranean Sea, west of the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli, at the Syrian town of Al-Hamidiyah, south of Tartus.
According to SANA, “poultry farms” were targeted in the airstrike, and two civilians were hurt. Damage was also caused to the site. Last month, the Damascus International Airport was targeted in a major attack and forced to be shuttered for two weeks.
 

Tunisia’s president said on Tuesday his proposed Constitution would not restore authoritarian rule, hitting back at criticism from across the political spectrum and urging people to support it in this month’s referendum.
Saied, who ousted the elected parliament last summer to rule by decree in a step his foes call a coup, has published a draft of a new Constitution that would greatly expand his powers while weakening checks on his actions, Reuters reported.
The president’s supporters say he is standing up to elite forces whose bungling and corruption have condemned Tunisia to a decade of political paralysis and economic stagnation.
In a letter published online he said there was no danger to Tunisians’ rights and freedoms.
“Everyone knows what Tunisia has suffered for decades, especially the last decade. They emptied state coffers. The poor got poorer, the corrupt got richer,” Said said, accusing critics of his Constitution of “slanders, far from reality”.