ROME, May 18 (Reuters) – Salvage crews will employ huge cranes and air tanks to refloat the half-submerged Costa Concordia cruise liner in the largest ever operation of its kind, according to a plan unveiled on Friday.

Estimated to cost at least $300 million, the work is expected to begin within a few days and last about a year, said the ship’s operator Costa Cruises, owned by Carnival Corp & Plc.

The 290-metre-long (11,417 feet) cruise liner capsized off the Tuscan island of Giglio after hitting rocks on Jan. 13. At least 30 people died and two are still unaccounted for.

Its captain Francesco Schettino has been accused of wrecking the ship after he brought it too close to shore and faces charges of multiple manslaughter and abandoning ship before all 4,200 passengers and crew were rescued.

Representatives of Titan Salvage of the United States and Italian firm Micoperi, who have been chosen to handle the removal, told a news conference they were confident the plans would succeed even though they have never been tested on a ship this size.

“This will be the largest refloat in history but we think it’s entirely possible,” said Richard Habib, president of Titan Salvage, owned by U.S. group Crowley Maritime Corp.

The head of Italy’s Civil Protection Agency, Franco Gabrielli, said the ship would be stabilised by the end of August to prevent it from shifting down a rocky ledge and plunging into the deep waters of the surrounding marine reserve.

ROME (Reuters) – Governments are failing to fund projects to improve access to toilets and other sanitation services in poor countries because the subject remains “taboo”, a director at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation said on Monday.

“Who wants to talk about shit?” asked Frank Rijsberman, Director of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene at the $34 billion charitable foundation, during an interview with Reuters on Monday.

“It’s the last big taboo and as a result more than one million kids die every year. Diarrhoea is the second largest cause of death after respiratory infections in young children,” he said at the Global Water Summit 2012 conference in Rome.

Rijsberman said global leaders should take opportunities like the U.N. conference for sustainable development in Rio in June to set new sanitation targets.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, set up by the founder of technology giant Microsoft and his wife, has already given grants to researchers to come up with cheaper and more efficient toilets, he added.

“We need the cellphone of sanitation, an aspirational product,” Rijsberman said.

Ideas submitted so far include inventions that turned dried human waste into a kind of cooking fuel, or used microwaves to transform it into electricity.

ROME (Reuters) – India’s economic growth and political stability are at stake in coming years if it does not change its approach to water management, a member of its natural resources planning commission told Reuters on Monday.

Mihir Shah, who has been asked by India’s government to come up with a new water resource strategy, said the sector needed to become more sustainable, efficient and focused on how water is used and how it reaches people.

“If this is not attended to, India’s growth story will completely go off the rails,” Shah said during an interview at the Global Water Summit 2012 conference in Rome.

“There will be water conflicts, conflicts between users, across regions, they will become very serious and a threat to the democratic fabric itself,” he said, adding that neighboring Pakistan and Bangladesh faced similar challenges.

Water limits are close to being breached in several countries, while food output has to increase by up to 100 percent by 2050 to sustain a growing world population, according to the United Nations.

India’s economy is seen growing about 7 percent in 2012 and 2013, down from the 8.4 percent levels of the last two years, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said this month.

It is one of the world’s fastest growing economies, but development is uneven and millions still live in poverty in rural areas and urban slums with limited access to clean water and sanitation facilities.

ROME, April 11 (Reuters) – Italy will scale back financial incentives for solar and other renewable energy that have inflated consumer power bills more than expected, and also will raise national renewable energy targets for 2020, two ministers said on Wednesday.

Italy’s green power industry has boomed in recent years as investors from around the world ranging from banks and private equity funds to utilities poured billions of euros into the sector, lured by generous support measures.

With incentives ballooning above expected limits, Rome has decided to cut the support, which has burdened household and industrial consumers who pay for it through power bills that are among the highest in Europe.

Under the new decrees approved by Industry and Environment Ministers, renewable energy incentives will be cut by about 3 billion euros a year below levels they would have reached under the current support scheme, the ministries said presenting the new measures.

Production incentives for solar power generation, keenly watched by investors, will be slashed by about 35 percent on average while incentives for non-solar energy sector will be cut by about 10-15 percent, said Leonardo Senni, head of the energy department at the industry ministry.

“The measures appear to be more penalising for the solar sector and fairly neutral for other renewable energy,” one analyst said on condition of anonymity.

Under the new support scheme for solar power generation, new spending on incentives will be capped at 500 million euros a year while a total cumulative annual incentives spending limit is set at 6.5 billion euros.

ROME (Reuters) – Pope Benedict called for perseverance in the face of an economic crisis that has led to hardship and rising unemployment across Europe as he presided over a procession around Rome’s Colosseum to mark Jesus Christ’s crucifixion and death on Good Friday.

The German pontiff, who turns 85 this month, stood before thousands of people holding candles at the traditional Via Crucis (Way of the Cross) march and listened to reflections on family unity that lamented divorce, abortion and infidelity.

Families from Italy, Ireland, Burkina Faso and Peru took turns carrying a cross around the ancient site associated with early Christian martyrs in one of the main services before Easter, the climax of the Christian year.

“The situation of many families is made worse by the threat of unemployment and other negative effects of the economic crisis,” the pope said.

“At times of trouble, when our families have to face pain and adversity, let us look to Christ’s cross. There we can find the courage and the strength to press on.”

The economic crisis has led to increasing poverty and hardship in Europe and countries such as Greece and Italy have seen a wave of suicides in recent weeks linked to financial woes such as unemployment and companies going bankrupt.

Wearing a red cape, the pontiff listened to 14 meditations composed by elderly married couple Danilo and Anna Maria Zanzucchi, founders of a Christian movement that emphasizes unity and commitment within the family.

ROME (Reuters) – Italy is in recession, final data confirmed on Monday, underscoring the difficulties facing Mario Monti’s technocrat government as it grapples with a shrinking economy dragged down by austerity measures and a debt crisis.

Italy’s economy shrank 0.7 percent in the fourth quarter of 2011, following a 0.2 percent decline in gross domestic product in the third quarter.

Monti, who rushed through a 33 billion euro austerity plan in December and is now working on reforms to boost growth, is due to meet Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday for talks in Rome.

Germany’s economy contracted by 0.2 percent in the fourth quarter, but analysts are expecting Europe’s largest economy to pick up steam again this year, while Italy is seen lagging.

Weak consumption in the euro zone’s third largest economy weighed heavily in the fourth quarter, while investments and inventories also declined but net exports contributed positively.

“Domestic demand is the weakest link, the area hardest hit by fiscal tightening,” said Paolo Mameli from Intesa Sanpaolo, who said GDP would likely decline by a similar rate in the first quarter of 2012.

Italy’s national statistics office ISTAT said GDP fell 0.4 percent year-on-year in the fourth quarter, revising a preliminary estimate of a 0.5 percent fall.

ROME, March 12 (Reuters) – Italy is in recession, final data confirmed on Monday, underscoring the difficulties facing Mario Monti’s technocrat government as it grapples with a shrinking economy dragged down by austerity measures and a debt crisis.

Italy’s economy shrank 0.7 percent in the fourth quarter of 2011, following a 0.2 percent decline in gross domestic product in the third quarter.

Monti, who rushed through a 33 billion euro austerity plan in December and is now working on reforms to boost growth, is due to meet Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday for talks in Rome.

Germany’s economy contracted by 0.2 percent in the fourth quarter, but analysts are expecting Europe’s largest economy to pick up steam again this year, while Italy is seen lagging.

Weak consumption in the euro zone’s third largest economy weighed heavily in the fourth quarter, while investments and inventories also declined but net exports contributed positively.

“Domestic demand is the weakest link, the area hardest hit by fiscal tightening,” said Paolo Mameli from Intesa Sanpaolo, who said GDP would likely decline by a similar rate in the first quarter of 2012.

Italy’s national statistics office ISTAT said GDP fell 0.4 percent year-on-year in the fourth quarter, revising a preliminary estimate of a 0.5 percent fall.

ROME (Reuters) – Bank of Italy Governor Ignazio Visco on Wednesday urged Italians not to resist a labour market reform Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti has said he will present by the end of the month with or without the support of the country’s powerful unions.

Visco said a better functioning labour market that embraces changes in technology, markets and businesses had to go hand in hand with other structural reforms such as deregulation.

He said Italians should put aside any “desire to resist” change that would underpin long-term growth and help reduce Italy’s debt, which amounts to about 120 percent of gross domestic product.

Welfare Minister Elsa Fornero on Wednesday called a meeting with labour unions and employers for Monday to resume talks on the controversial reform.

Italy’s biggest union, the CGIL, has pledged to fight to maintain article 18 of the labour statute, which was adopted in 1970. It obliges firms with more than 15 employees to re-instate workers ruled to be wrongfully dismissed, with full payment of lost salary.

Fornero has said that changing Article 18 shouldn’t be a “taboo,” and on Sunday she pledged a “radical” reform.

Monti’s technocrat government took power in November, when spiralling market concerns about the sustainability of the country’s 1.9 trillion euro public debt led to the resignation of former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

ROME (Reuters) – Members of the English parliament wrote to Pope Clement VII in 1530 urging him to annul Henry VIII’s marriage to his first wife so the king could marry Anne Boleyn, according to Vatican documents on display to the public for the first time.

In the large parchment letter, hung with over 80 pendant seals attached with red silk ribbon, they alluded to the “extreme remedies” they could pursue if their request were refused.

The letter, which preceded Henry’s divorce from Catherine of Aragon and his rejection of the pope’s authority, is one of 100 documents that have been released from the Vatican Secret Archives for display in Rome’s Capitoline museums, the first time they have been allowed outside the Vatican City.

A 60 metre parchment scroll documenting proceedings of the trial of the Knights Templar medieval Christian military order, accused of heresy and sexual misconduct, is partially rolled out in one room of the museums, alongside secret manuscripts, letters and codices.

A register containing the excommunication of 16th century German reformer Martin Luther, and a report on the trial of Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei, who was condemned by the Inquisition for asserting that the Earth revolved around the Sun, are also on show.

Archivist Pier Paolo Piergentili said this was the first time in the archive’s 400 year history that it was opening up a selection of documents for public display.

“The aim is to physically show the sources of history, and make available the documents that have created history in Europe, and not only Europe,” he said.