A major security operation was being put in place in Rome ahead of the arrival later Friday of US President George W Bush, with two anti-US demonstrations planned for Saturday afternoon in the Italian capital high on the police's list of concerns, REPORTED DPA. Up to 10,000 Italian law enforcement agents as well as 150 US security officials will protect the president during his 36-hour visit to Italy - his first in three years - daily La Repubblica reported. Bush's Air Force One plane was to arrive from Poland and land in Rome's main Fiumicino airport around 10 pm (2000 GMT) Friday and depart on Sunday morning from the same airport. The president's Saturday agenda includes meetings with Italy President Giorgio Napolitano, Pope Benedict XVI and Prime Minister Romano Prodi. A planned lunchtime visit to the historic neighbourhood of Trastevere was cancelled at the 11th hour due to "logistic concerns", a White House spokesperson said Friday. The Italian Interior Ministry had tried to dissuade the president from going to Trastevere as its cobbled alleyways are too narrow to accommodate limousines - meaning Bush would have had to travel part of the journey on foot. A scheduled meeting in Trastevere with officials from the Community of Sant Egidio, a Christian group that acts as a mediator in international peace negotiations, was now expected to take place in Villa Taverna, the residence of the US ambassador to Italy, officials said. While in Rome, Bush was also expected to have a brief evening meeting with opposition leader and former premier Silvio Berlusconi, a like-minded conservative who often described the US president as "my friend George." The man in charge of security in Rome, Prefect Achille Serra, played down concerns Friday but warned that neither protest march would be allowed to progress if masked or armed people were spotted among its participants. An estimated 200,000 left-wingers, pacifists and anti- globalisation activists planned to take part in the demos, which police fear might be infiltrated by violent Black Block radicals that brought havoc to similar demonstrations in Germany earlier this week.
