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Italy hopes for quake reconstruction pledges at G8

(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-07-03 10:58

ROME: Italy is using the upcoming Group of Eight summit in quake-devastated central Italy to encourage participating countries to adopt monuments damaged in the temblor and pledge to help restore them.

Premier Silvio Berlusconi said Thursday he would accompany individual heads of state, including the US and German leaders, to various quake-damaged sites in L'Aquila as part of Italy's bid to round up international funding for the euro30 million ($42 million) restoration effort.

Collapsed houses are seen in the village of Onna, which was destroyed by an earthquake, on the outskirts of L'Aquila June 24, 2009. Earthquake survivors in central Italy's L'Aquila hope that hosting next week's G8 summit will bring aid to rebuild their homes from the rubble, providing a grim metaphor for the task world leaders face on the economy. [Agencies]

Already, the Culture Ministry has produced a chart of 45 of the most heavily damaged monuments, listing their artistic and historical significance, links to other countries, as well as a rundown of the damage suffered and the estimated reconstruction time and costs.

In addition, there will be an exhibit at the summit venue of artworks recovered from quake-leveled churches and museums. The exhibit, "Beautiful L'Aquila Can Never Die," will open to the public after the summit ends and then tour the world in a bid to round up further funding.

L'Aquila's historic center boasts buildings that represent some of the great stages of Western architecture - Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque. While not a major tourist destination like Florence or Venice, the scenic city of some 70,000 has ancient fortifications, castles, churches, and tombs of saints - many of which were heavily damaged in the April 6 earthquake, which killed nearly 300 people.

Berlusconi said Thursday that during next week's summit, he would accompany President Barack Obama to the 14th century Santa Maria di Paganica church in central L'Aquila, whose roof, cupola and bell tower caved in during the 6.3-magnitude quake.

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The church's reconstruction is estimated at taking two years and costing euro4.5 million ($6.32 million). The Culture Ministry says the church has particular ties to Italian emigrants in North America.

Germany, meanwhile, has already offered to rebuild the church in the tiny hamlet of Onna, a village which was nearly leveled by the quake and lost 40 of its 300 residents. Berlusconi said he would accompany German Chancellor Angela Merkel on a tour of the hamlet, which was the site of a massacre of civilians by German troops in 1944.

A French delegation visited Italy earlier this month to look into adopting the Anime Sante church, an important house of worship for residents located in L'Aquila's main piazza. The church lost its cupola and suffered major damage throughout. Its reconstruction is estimated at taking four years and euro6.5 million.

Berlusconi has also said he hopes Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who is attending the summit as well, will contribute to rebuilding the 16th century Spanish Castle in L'Aquila. The enormous fort houses the Abruzzo National Museum and was heavily damaged.

In addition, one of the events for the G8 spouses is a tour of some of L'Aquila's damaged treasures.

The purpose of the visits and exhibit, Berlusconi said, "is to show them (summit participants) what the quake did to the monuments that were and will be the pride of this city of art."

On Thursday, the World Monuments Fund, a New York-based private organization dedicated to saving the world's treasures, said it had committed to a $2 million restoration effort at the San Clemente a Casauria abbey in Pescara.

The San Clemente church suffered a partial collapse of the roof between the nave and transept, the Culture Ministry says.