Rome - As more than 400 would-be immigrants landed on Monday in Sicily, Italy's Interior Minister Roberto Maroni said such arrivals from the North Africa would stop once an agreement involving Libyan naval patrols comes into effect in May.

"There's a commitment by the Libyan government to begin patrolling its coastline with six boats beginning on May 15," Maroni said.

"I have no reason to doubt that this will happen and that hence the problem will be solved," he added.

Rome - AC Milan goalkeeper Christian Abbiati successfully underwent knee surgery Monday in Belgium and began rehabilitation expected to last six months, his club's website reported.

Abbiati, 31, damaged the cruciate ligament in his right knee clashing with team mate Giuseppe Favalli on March 15 during a Serie A game against Siena.

A similar operation could be necessary for international striker Antonio Di Natale, who was stretchered off the pitch Saturday as Italy beat Montenegro 2-0 in a 2010 World Cup qualifier.

Rome - The co-founder of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's new party restated Monday his dissent with Berlusconi's plans to change Italy's constitution, including more powers for the premier, regardless of the views of the country's opposition.

Gianfranco Fini, speaker of parliament's lower house Chamber of Deputies, was commenting on remarks made by Berlusconi on Sunday at the People of Freedom party's opening congress.

London, Mar 29 : Michele Mongelli, the ‘Italian Josef Fritzl’ who kept his daughter prisoner and brutally raped her for 25 years, was known to police, it has emerged.

Listening devices had been placed in the handset of Mongelli, a 63-year-old a scrap metal dealer in Turin, as part of the probe against him and his son Giuseppe, 41.

Officers heard him carry out the attack on his daughter, 34, after the handset had been misplaced, reports The Telegraph.

Rome - Argentina football icon Diego Maradona has paid a minimal part of the large tax payment he owes the Italian state from the years he spent playing with Napoli, the Association of Italian taxpayers (Contribuenti. it) reported on Saturday.

"The Italian revenue has been unable to levy from Maradona more than 0.10 per cent (of what he owes)," said Contribuenti. it president Vittorio Carlomagno as he criticized how taxes are collected in Italy.

London, Mar 27: Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who last year referred to Barack Obama as “sun-tanned”, has returned to the same subject after he claimed the difference between their leadership styles was that he is ‘paler’.

The 72-year-old made the comment to a reporter who compared the two leaders and their handling of the economic crisis.

It so happened that a journalist commented that his response to the global economic crisis made him seem like Obama, reports The Guardian.