Italy launches investigation into racist slurs against first black minister...

The Italian government ordered an investigation yesterday into slurs on right-wing websites against the country's first black minister – a case that has put Italy's racial problems back in the spotlight.

Cecile Kyenge, an eye doctor and Congo-born Italian citizen, was named integration minister in the new government of Prime Minister Enrico Letta last Saturday. She is one of seven women in the government.

Since then, she has been the subject of taunts not only on neo-Fascist websites but was also the victim of race-tinged remarks by a politician of the Northern League, which has been allied in the past with former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.

 Equal opportunities minister, Josefa Idem, ordered an investigation by the National Anti-Discrimination Office into websites which called Kyenge a "Congolese monkey," "Zulu," "the black anti-Italian," and other slurs. Full story...

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