By Prensa Latina
Rome : The Italian ministerial cabinet will start a series of meetings on Monday to decide how it will manage the accumulation of urban garbage in Naples and the region of Campania.
The garbage in the city and part of that southern region has not been collected since December 21, 2007, due to a lack of dumps, so people burn their domestic wastes, thus polluting the environment.
During the 2006 spring, 15,000 tons of garbage accumulated.
Residents in the Neapolitan neighborhood of Pianura clashed with the police for the third consecutive day, as the latter tried to break a roadblock to the city’s dump, closed in 1996 and reopened until 2009, when a waste-processing plant will start up operations.
The situation in Campania is an old problem that dates back to 1994, due to the lack of dumps and waste-processing facilities, although the state has invested one billion euros and has appointed eight commissioners to handle the problem.
The government blames local authorities and the Neapolitan mafia, the Camorra, which runs the structure to collect and dispose the wastes.
The mayors of the municipalities of Caserta, Volla, Gragnano and San Giorgio decided to keep schools closed for an undertermined period.
In statements to reporters on Sunday, upon returning to Rome after his winter vacations, President Giorgio Napolitano insisted that the garbage crisis must be solved, and expressed the government strong commitment in that regard.