Italian screen icon Sophia Loren on Friday appealed to people living in Campania to redouble their efforts to resolve the ongoing trash crisis in the region.
The 74-year-old diva, who grew up in the seaside town of Pozzuoli, near Naples, said she had watched with ''profound anxiety'' as authorities have struggled to clear the backlog of rubbish from the region's streets, where it has been piling up since a collapse in the collection system in January.
''I've followed the tragedy of rubbish strewn across Campania, in Naples and in my Pozzuoli, on those streets where I played as a child,'' she said in Rome daily La Repubblica.
''How could this have happened? How could it have come to a point where the dignity, beauty and ancient culture of one of the most beautiful places in the world has been offended like this?
''The lives of my fellow citizens, Neapolitans and people in Campania deserve greater respect''.
The actress urged residents of the region to collaborate with the authorities ''so that we can find a solution fast''.
''I beg you from the bottom of my heart to increase the efforts, to put a stop to this calamity,'' she said.
''It's our problem, and we're the ones who have to solve it, or at least help to solve it,'' she said.
Loren was born in Rome on September 20, 1934 but her family moved to Pozzuoli to live with her grandmother during the war.
She shot to fame in 1955 with the film Pane, Amore e ... with Vittorio De Sica, which was shot in Sorrento, and went on to have a hugely successful Hollywood career, starring in a string of classic movies with actors like Cary Grant, Clark Gable and Anthony Quinn.
The government-appointed emergency trash commission on Wednesday said it was making inroads into shifting the backlog of waste in Campania.
Naples has been largely cleared of trash in recent weeks, although around 20,000 tonnes of rubbish still line streets in the rest of the region.
Regional authorities have run into violent opposition from residents living near sites earmarked by the commission for the storage and processing of trash.
Earlier this month Italy's Civil Protection Department appealed to famous actors and singers from the region to persuade people to do their bit when a new recycling scheme is launched in Naples next month.
