Italy's PM orders "trash tsar" to end crisis

By Robin Pomeroy

NAPLES (Reuters) - Prime Minister Romano Prodi gave Italy's former police chief four months to clean up a garbage crisis in Naples where tons of rotting rubbish sparked clashes between police and residents on Tuesday.

A neighborhood on the outskirts of Italy's third largest city has been sealed off since Saturday by protesters trying to stop truckloads of garbage being brought in for dumping. Police fired tear gas overnight to disperse protesters.

Refuse collection in Naples and the surrounding Campania region stopped around Christmas when almost every dump was declared full. As a result, 110,000 tons of garbage has piled up in the streets.

The government tried to reopen a landfill in the Pianura suburb that closed 11 years ago. Locals say the dump is unsafe and have used metal fences, concrete blocks and trees to block access to the dump.

On Tuesday, Prodi named Gianni De Gennaro as the new "trash tsar" and told him to sort out a problem which has been brewing for decades.

Prodi said he would continue to use the military to help solve the crisis. The army has already cleared some rubbish so Naples schools could reopen.

Three incinerators and a "sufficient number of landfills" would also be opened in the southern region, Prodi said, without giving a timeframe.

Councils have four months to come up with a plan to comply with long-ignored rules for recycling garbage or face special administration by the government, Prodi said.