A roundup of the latest news on Friday

Three arrested over attack on Jewish tourists in Venice

“Two foreign Jewish tourists were surrounded and beaten by a group of 10 attackers,” in the incident, according to Venice’s deputy mayor in charge of tourism, Simone Venturini.

He denounced the “shameful” attack, which reportedly occurred on the Strada Nova thoroughfare near the Rialto Bridge just after midnight on Monday.

Italian authorities have not yet officially confirmed the identity of the perpetrators, AFP reported, but Venice’s police chief on Thursday told media that three people had been arrested.

One of them was deported to their country of origin and another was placed in a migrant detention centre, he said.

Antisemitic attacks have risen sharply in European countries, fuelled in part by Israel’s conflict with Hamas since the Palestinian group’s October 7 attack, according to AFP.

Italy signs illegal migration deal with Turkey

Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani and his Turkish counterpart Hakan Fidan signed a deal on Thursday on closer cooperation between their coastguards to combat human trafficking and transnational organised crime, Tajani said at a joint press conference in Rome.

“This will prove very useful in Libya, particularly in preventing the departure” of illegal migrants to Europe, he said, according to AFP reports.

Libya is a key transit country for thousands of migrants seeking to reach Europe by sea each year.

Italy is already party to a 2016 EU-wide deal with Turkey on illegal migration.

The controversial deal between Brussels and Ankara has seen the EU pay Ankara billions of euros in exchange for Turkey taking back irregular migrants reaching Europe.

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Rome to open River Tiber to swimmers “within five years”

A plan to open Rome’s river to public swimming is “absolutely within reach” by 2031, according to Mayor Roberto Gualtieri.

Speaking at an event at the Osaka Expo 2025, Gualtieri on Wednesday reiterated the plans announced earlier this summer, though he said costs were still being estimated.

The mayor pointed to the Seine in Paris, which was opened to public swimming for the first time in a century last year after a €1.4 billion clean-up – and said a similar project in Rome would cost less.

Some stretches of Rome’s river, on certain days, he said, would “be suitable for swimming today” but that “to ensure full bathing safety … some interventions are needed.”

His comments were received with widespread scepticism in Italy, with local newspaper Roma Today writing: “The road to making the Tiber swimmable in five years is anything but downhill. For now, it remains a distant goal.”

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Naples opens new landmark metro station

Naples on Thursday inaugurated its Monte Sant’Angelo metro station, designed by British-Indian sculptor Anish Kapoor.

Campania regional governor Vincenzo De Luca officially opened the station on the new Line 7, following more than two decades of work.

Part of the city’s ‘art stations’ programme, the design for the new station was initially commissioned in 2003.

Kapoor, who was at the opening, said the design was inspired by the city’s geology and mythology.

“In the city of Mount Vesuvius and Dante’s mythical entrance to the Inferno, I found it important to try and deal with what it really means to go underground,”