Rome - Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi lashed out Saturday at unions representing Alitalia employees, saying their opposition to a government plan to save the troubled state-controlled airline is politically motivated.

Berlusconi was speaking a day after a group of private Italian investors, CAI, broke off talks with the unions who reject an estimated 7,000 job cuts as specified in the cost-slashing rescue plan.

Rome  - An Italian government-approved plan to save Alitalia was in disarray Friday with the collapse of talks between unions representing employees and a group of Italian investors seeking to take over the troubled state-controlled airline.

Following a week of unsuccessful talks with the unions, the grouping of investors, CAI, said in a statement Friday that "conditions to continue negotiations do not exist."

CAI blamed the unions for not "not recognizing the dramatic nature of Alitalia's situation and of the need for the profound break with the past that the rescue plan calls for."

Frankfurt  - Lufthansa disclosed Thursday plans to upgrade its services operating out of Italy, but denied that the move was prompted by the maladies of its Italian rival Alitalia.

The German airline is to use six Airbus jets instead of the smaller Embraer planes it originally ordered for the new flights set to begin in February 2009.

A Lufthansa subsidiary, Air Dolomiti, will carry passengers direct from Milan's Malpensa Airport to Barcelona, Brussels, Madrid, Paris and other cities, said the group in Frankfurt.

To date, Air Dolomiti has mainly operated feeder flights to Lufthansa's Frankfurt and Munich hubs.

Rome  - Syria Thursday marked another step in its improving relations with the West by signing an agreement with Italy aimed at boosting political, economic and cultural ties.

"Co-operation between Italy and Syria has resumed through intense dialogue," Italian Foreign Minister, Franco Frattini, said at a joint news conference in Rome with Syrian counterpart, Wallid Moallem.

London - The leaders of Italy and Britain Wednesday pledged to end the European economies' dependancy on oil by pushing ahead with investment in nuclear power and alternative energy sources.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, in London for talks with Prime Minister Gordon Brown, said Italy had "suffered from the Greens" in its ambitions to use nuclear power and he was determined to "catch up on lost time."

Salerno, Italy - Some 5,000 people on Tuesday began moving out of their homes in the southern Italian town of Salerno after builders discovered an unexploded World War II bomb.

Officials ordered residents, living within 250 metres of the construction site where the 230-kilogram device was found, to evacuate their homes while explosives experts decided what to do with it, the ANSA news agency reported.

Salerno's Mayor Vincenzo De Luca said that while he hoped the device would be disposed of "as soon as possible," people would probably only be allowed to return to their homes from Sunday afternoon.