Naples Roma camp abandoned following attack

May 14, 2008, 10:23 GMT

Naples, Italy Abandoned shacks, some still smouldering, were all that remained Wednesday of a Roma camp in Naples which was attacked by locals incensed by the alleged attempt by a Roma girl to kidnap a baby.

Police completed the camp's evacuation shortly after midnight when they escorted some 100 Roma out of the settlement situated in Naples' low-income Ponticelli district.

On Tuesday afternoon during a protest staged by Ponticelli residents against the camp, several molotov cocktails were hurled at the shacks setting them on fire.

Police had to intervene to separate the crowd, some of them shouting: 'Out with the thieves of children!' as they confronted the Roma community.

Authorities then began to move the camp's inhabitants to other Roma settlements in Naples.

Sentiments against the Roma have run high in Ponticelli since Saturday, when according to news reports, police prevented a mob from lynching a 17-year-old Roma girl accused of kidnapping a baby.

According to the baby's mother, the Roma girl had entered their house while the door was unlocked, picked up the child and tried to escape, but was subsequently caught.

The Roma girl is being held in custody on charges of attempted abduction and housebreaking.

The incident is the latest of a series of high profile cases involving Italy's Roma community - many of whom are of Romanian nationality.

The newly-elected, centre-right government of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi on Tuesday unveiled a set of five points to safeguard security, including the expulsion of immigrants who are not gainfully employed.

Interior Minister Roberto Maroni said the government intends to dismantle Roma camps which are present in and around many of Italy's major cities.

Late last year the previous centre-left government expelled over 200 Romanian nationals with criminal records, in the wake of the murder, allegedly by a Roma man of Romanian origin, of a housewife in Rome.