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The following are some of the comments by Italian politicians on the expansion of the U.S. air force base in Vicenza that have appeared in the Italian press this week.

Italy's Prime Minister Romano Prodi said Tuesday that his government would not block an $800-million U.S. plan to expand an air base near Vicenza to accommodate a significant increase in the U.S. Army's presence in northern Italy. Mr. Prodi's announcement followed weeklong polemics within the ruling majority and between it and the opposition, which accused the country's left-wing parties of anti-Americanism.

In a controversial move this week, the Italian government decided to push for an international moratorium on capital punishment. President Giorgio Napolitano praised the decision calling it "a beautiful visiting card" for Italy at the United Nations Security Council, which his country joined as non-permanent member on Jan. 1 for the 2007-2008 period.

Italian commentators are supportive of their country's move to put a worldwide ban on capital punishment and reject comparisons between the executions of Saddam Hussein and of their own homegrown dictator, Benito Mussolini.

The center-left government of Romano Prodi has cut the Italian armed forces' recruitment budget. Some say this may have an adverse effect on Italian participation in NATO missions and that it may even jeopardize ongoing operations.

A group of Italian right- and left-wing youth and student organizations has written to Iran's ambassador to Italy, Bahram Ghassemi, inquiring about the conditions of a group of Iranian students who staged a protest last week against Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Tehran. The Italian organizations, which have formed a group called "Comitato Teheran 2007," want to send a delegation to Iran in January to meet with the dissidents.

Can Alleanza Nazionale join the European Popular Party (E.P.P.)? No, says E.P.P. chief Wilfried Martens. "We don't want to cooperate with either the far left or the far right," he said in Rome Wednesday, adding, however, that he had not received a membership application from the A.N.

Some believe troops can do little to help Naples if Neapolitans don't show any desire to help themselves.