By mid-August most of the 400 shops in Rome's Chinatown will have bilingual signs, the city government official responsible for security confirmed on Wednesday.
Jean Leonard Touadi said this was the first application of a May 11 agreement signed with the Chinese community in the capital aimed at improving relations between residents and immigrants.
The Rome government sought the agreement with the Chinese community following a riot in Milan last April which saw hundreds of Chinese immigrants clash with police over a crackdown on commercial traffic in the city's small Chinatown area.
Milan's 13,000-strong Chinese community had accused city authorities of hounding them over two months, imposing fines and inspections on shopkeepers for breaching road and trading regulations and confiscating their goods trolleys, which are banned for transporting merchandise.
The city council justified its actions an an attempt to force the Chinese to abide by laws governing the hours in which merchandise can be delivered and change the methods by which goods are shifted from vehicles to shops to prevent public obstructions.
