VIRGINIA RAGGI

Italy is entering five days of political and financial uncertainty after the 5-Star Movement sparked a government crisis by withholding support on a government-sponsored bill.

Italy's center-left forces have won big in Rome and most other significant mayoral races, dealing a heavy blow to right-wing parties that have been hoping to capture the premiership in the next national election.

Anybody who has visited Rome, Italy lately might have had a “boar”-ing time.

Italy Mayoral Elections Scrutineers count ballots after the closing of a polling station, in Rome, Monday, Oct. 4, 2021. The 5-Stars, currently Parliament's largest party, also failed to clinch a mayoral runoff slot in Turin, where one of their own had been mayor since 2016, with nearly 40% of the ballots counted. Salvini has ambitions to win the premiership of a center-right government he hopes will be formed after Italy's parliamentary election. But with wins in Milan, Naples and Bologna and spots in mayoral runoffs in Rome and Turin, “we showed that the center-right is beatable,” Letta told supporters. Key to winning the Rome mayoral runoff will be wooing support from Raggi's disappointed backers.

Italy Mayoral Elections Rome Mayor Virgina Raggi poses for photographers as she casts her ballot at a polling station, in Rome, Sunday, Oct. 3, 2021. First projections for Rome indicated that Raggi was trailing the top two vote-getters by some 10% points, RAI state TV said, but other media's projections indicated she might have clinched a runoff berth. Leading in state TV's projections for Rome were a center-left candidate and a center-right candidate, with neither winning more than 50% of the vote. When Raggi was elected as Rome mayor in 2016, she was one of the most prominent faces in the 5-Star Movement, the populist party that is now the largest party in Parliament. But where the Movement's candidate did run in a campaign alliance with the Democrats and other smaller left-leaning groupings, first projections indicated that appeared to be a successful move.

Italy's center-left forces, led by Democrats, are triumphing or clinching runoff slots in Milan and other big city mayoral elections, according to partial vote counts after two days of balloting.

Italy Rome in Ruins Rome Mayor Virginia Raggi arrives for a meeting at the Rome's Foreign Press association offices, Thursday, Sept. 16, 2021. After five years in office as Rome’s first populist mayor, Virginia Raggi is running for a second term in the city’s Oct. 3-4 election. Nearly all the mayoral races in the biggest cities, including Rome, Turin, Naples and Bologna, are expected to see runoffs. Around 12 million people, or roughly 20% of Italy’s population, are eligible to vote in the mayoral races. Rome Mayor Virginia Raggi, a prominent populist 5-Star Movement figure, has been fighting an uphill battle to keep her office.

Millions of people are voting in Italy for new mayors including in the nation's main cities.

Italy Rome in Ruins A burnt scooter is abandoned in a parking lot of Trastevere's neighborhood of Rome, Wednesday, Sept. 15, 2021. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini) (Andrew Medichini)ROME — (AP) — Curbside weeds in Rome grow so tall, they cover car door handles, giving new meaning to the term urban jungle. With sidewalks impassable because of piles of uncollected trash, people resort to pushing baby strollers down the middle of pothole-pocked streets. They had taken to cleaning up Rome themselves, neighborhood by neighborhood, park by park, bagging trash, filling potholes and passing the hat to pay gardening businesses to pull weeds in playgrounds. But she quickly added: “Whoever becomes mayor will have it hard.”——AP journalist Andrea Rosa contributed to this report.

After five years in office as Rome’s first populist mayor, Virginia Raggi is running for a second term in the city’s election Sunday and Monday.

The hogs can survive in almost any environment, including cities, where they often feed off garbage.

Entire families of wild boars have become a daily sight in Rome, as groups of 10-30 beasts emerge from nearby parks to trot down city streets in search of food in Rome's overflowing trash bins.

Rome has been invaded by Gauls, Visigoths and vandals over the centuries, but the Eternal City is now grappling with a rampaging force of an entirely different sort: rubbish-seeking wild boars.

Rome has been invaded by Gauls, Visigoths and vandals over the centuries, but the Eternal City is now grappling with a rampaging force of an entirely different sort: rubbish-seeking wild boars. Entire families of wild boars have become a daily sight in Rome, as groups of 10-30 beasts young and old emerge from the vast parks surrounding the city to trot down traffic-clogged streets in search of food in Rome’s notoriously overflowing rubbish bins. Posting wild boar videos on social media has become something of a sport as exasperated Romans capture the scavengers marching past their stores, strollers or playgrounds.

The monumental pomerial stone is dating back to Roman Emperor Claudio and was used to mark the ‘pomerium’ the sacred boundaries of the ‘Urbe’, the city of Rome, during the Roman empire. (AP Photo/Domenico Stinellis) (Domenico Stinellis)ROME — (AP) — Archaeologists have discovered a rare stone delineating the city limits of ancient Rome that dates from the age of Emperor Claudius in 49 A.D. and was found during excavations for a new sewage system. “The founding act of the city of Rome starts from the realization of this ‘pomerium,''' he said of the consecrated area. The stone features an inscription that allowed archaeologists to date it to Claudius and the expansion of the pomerium in 49 A.D., which established Rome's new city limits. Raggi noted that only 10 other stones of this kind had been discovered in Rome, the last one 100 years ago.

Archaeologists have discovered a rare stone delineating the city limits of ancient Rome that dates from the age of Emperor Claudius in 49 A.D. Rome Mayor Virginia Raggi was on hand for the unveiling Friday of the pomerial stone, a huge slab of travertine that was a sacred, military and political perimeter marking the edge of the city proper with Rome’s outer territory.

Archaeologists have discovered a rare stone delineating the city limits of ancient Rome that dates from the age of Emperor Claudius in 49 A.D. and was found during excavations for a new sewage system. Rome Mayor Virginia Raggi was on hand for the unveiling Friday of the pomerial stone, a huge slab of travertine that was used as a sacred, military and political perimeter marking the edge of the city proper with Rome’s outer territory. It was found June 17 during excavations for a rerouted sewer under the recently restored mausoleum of Emperor Augustus, right off the central Via del Corso in Rome’s historic center.

Denmark coach Kasper Hjulmand says he cannot understand how a decisive penalty was awarded against his team in the 2-1 loss to England in the European Championship semifinals.

A COVID-19 patient from the Netherlands arrives for treatment by helicopter to the University hospital in Muenster, Germany, Friday, Oct. 23, 2020. The transfer is intended to reduce the coronavirus pressure on the intensive care units in the Netherlands. The hospital was transferring two patients to Germany on Friday. At the same time, the country has more than 8,100 intensive care beds free at the moment, with about 21,500 occupied, according to the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine. During the first phase of the pandemic, in the last week of March and first two weeks of April, Germany took in a total of 232 intensive care patients from Italy, France and the Netherlands.