Rome's Trevi Fountain was 'netted' on Thursday by environmentalists protesting against the use of illegal nets by Italian fishermen. Dozens of bewildered tourists looked on as a Greenpeace activist dressed like a mermaid waded into the waters of the landmark fountain.
The girl proceeded to clamber up onto the artificial rocks incorporated into the 18th-century monument and lie down in its shallow waters. The activists then spread a giant red net across her and the rest of the fountain.
Other protesters climbed onto the carved rocks to display two large banners.
One bore the slogan 'illegal fishing kills the sea' while the other said 'the only net needed is a net-work of marine reserves'.
The protest lasted more than 30 minutes before plain-clothes police moved in, removing the net and peacefully persuading the activists to get out of the fountain. The crowd-stopping spectacle was part of stepped-up protests by Greenpeace and other environmental associations over the continued use of banned drift nets by Italian fishermen.
Drift nets, which can be up to 20 kilometres long and 30 kilometres wide, are blamed for causing widespread damage to sea life and were banned by the European Union in 2002. Dubbed the "walls of death" by critics, the nets are left to drift at sea entangling everything that swims into them, including non-targeted fish, dolphins, whales and sea turtles which die as a result.
Before the 2002 ban, an estimated 8,000 dolphins died every year because of the nets and according to environmentalists, up to 80% of the catch yielded by them has to be thrown away. Last month, Greenpeace, the Italian branch of the World
Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and Italy's Legambiente called for tougher penalties for those caught breaking the ban after the
Italian environment ministry revealed that 400 kilometres of drift nets had been seized since the start of the year.
The ministry said that inspections carried out in the ports of Naples, Palermo and Reggio Calabria on one night alone led to the confiscation of more than 50 kilometres of drift nets.
Italy's new Environment Minister and Green party leader Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio subsequently said the government would clamp down on the phenomenon with more controls and sanctions.
Greenpeace has also launched a campaign for the creation of 32 marine reserves in the Mediterranean in which all fishing would be banned. Greenpeace's flagship Rainbow Warrior is currently touring the Mediterranean trying to drum up support for the project.
The organisation says the reserve network would protect the Mediterranean Sea and help prevent destructive overfishing.
It stresses that the Mediterranean's bluefish and red tuna populations have both fallen by 80% over the past 20 years.
