Italy's top story on Thursday:
A fire broke out at the Alpitronic factory on the outskirts of the northern city of Bolzano on Wednesday morning, causing the evacuation of a nearby high school and forcing the city to close its airspace.
Around 100 firefighters attended the scene, according to news reports, pumping water from the Isarco River to contain the blaze. No injuries were reported.
Alpitronic is a leading manufacturer of charging stations for electric cars. It was unclear what caused the fire, but initial reports suggest it started in an area where roof maintenance works were being carried out.
"The firefighters' intervention worked perfectly and the situation is now under control," Bolzano governor Arno Kompatscher told reporters on Wednesday, adding that no hazardous substances had been released into the atmosphere by the blaze.
Over two million people in 'involuntary' part-time work
More than two million workers in Italy can only find part-time employment despite wanting to work full time, according to a report released on Monday.
More than one in two, or 56.2 percent, of Italy's roughly 4.2 million part-time workers were in the position not out of choice but due to a lack of available full-time options, according to data from the non-profit association the Forum on Inequality and Diversity (FDD).
That's significantly higher than the EU average of 19.7 percent.
Foreign nationals, people in the south, and those with low educational qualifications were all disproportionately affected, as were women, with 16 percent of all working women in involuntary part-time positions as opposed to 5.6 percent of working men, the report found.
Brussels postpones Ita-Lufthansa merger decision
The EU has pushed back its deadline for approving a proposed merger between Italy's national flag carrier ITA and German airline Lufthansa to July 4th, financial newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore reported on Tuesday.
The European Commission in January raised objections to Lufthansa's plans to buy a 41-percent minority stake in ITA, citing concerns that the merger would harm competition on “several short- and long-haul routes", particularly to and from Milan's Linate airport.
The companies have reportedly proposed giving away 22 of Lufthansa's slots (for 11 return flights) at Linate to another airline, with Easyjet in pole position.
"We've done everything that can be done," said Italy's Economy Minister Giorgetti, who co-presented the proposal. "I believe that 99.99 percent of Italians think that this is a good deal... we await the referee's decision."
Vatican to clamp down on apparitions
The Vatican was set to release new rules on what constitutes an apparition, the Holy See announced on Tuesday, following increasing numbers of alleged sightings.
The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith scheduled a Vatican press conference on guidelines "to discern apparitions and other supernatural phenomena" for May 17th, according to news agency Ansa.
"The Madonna is not a postal worker," the Pope said, referring to claims of visions of the Virgin Mary on fixed times and dates.
In March, a local bishop concluded a year-long inquiry that found sightings of the Madonna by a woman in the lakeside town of Trevignano Romano, which drew hundreds of pilgrims to her monthly prayer meeting, were bogus.
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