When it was closed on the order of a judge for causing environmental damage, the ILVA steel plant in Taranto was the biggest in Europe. The parent ILVA group, which owns several other plants in Italy, was the largest in Europe, employing a total of 14,000 workers. Current figures suggest it is no longer the number one steel producer, and production has halved since the court order.
By government decree, the plants have to be sold by the end of June. Any offers must be received by February 20 but nothing concrete has emerged so far, even though the government has allocated €800 million for the environmental rehabilitation of the Taranto plant. Meanwhile, the group’s competitors in Europe have pushed the European Commission to open an inquiry into ILVA and the state subsidies it receives. The most persistent in asking for the Commission’s intervention has been one of ILVA’s major rivals, the German steel group ThyssenKrupp.
This shocking figure comes from Italian Institute of Statistics (Istat) data reported by Gian Carlo Blangiardo, demographer and director of the Statistics Department of Bicocca University in Milan. The mortality data cover the first seven months of 2015 and if the trend has continued, there will be 69,000 deaths more in 2015 than in 2014.
“Trident Juncture shows that NATO’s capabilities are real and ready,” said NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on Wednesday 4 November 2015. Trident Juncture, NATO’s largest exercise in over a decade, involved more than 36,000 personnel, more than 230 units, more than 140 aircraft and more than 60 ships. It took place in a number of locations, including Italy. 
