Abandoned prison for Mafia bosses reopens
It’s a remote paradise island where some of Italy's most notorious terrorists and Mafia bosses have served lengthy prison sentences.
Now the island of Pianosa, current population five, will open a newlyrenovated section of an abandoned prison in a bid to drive up visitor numbers.
Lodged between Corsica and the Tuscan mainland in Italy's Tyrrhenian Sea, Pianosa became a penal colony under Leopold II, Grand Duke of Tuscany, in 1856.
That led to the construction of a prison with four sections around the island, some of which remained in use during the fascist era when political opponents including Sandro Pertini, the socialist politician who would later serve as the country's president, were exiled there.
The Agrippa section, which takes its name from Agrippa Postumus, the Roman nobleman who was banished to the island by emperor Augustus in 7AD, functioned as a sanatorium for tuberculosis patients from 1884 to 1965.
It was transformed into a high security prison in 1977, a 3km-long reinforced concrete wall built around its perimeter.
In 1992, 55 Mafia bosses who had been placed in solitary confinement following the murders of judges Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino were transferred there by helicopter.
Abandoned in 1997, the prison has been managed by the Tuscan Archipelago National Park since last year.
The park restored a small part of the section over three months for a cost of €100,000 (NZ$180,000). It will be reopened to the public next week.
Visitors accompanied by tour guides will be able to walk down newly whitewashed corridors, peer into 5x4-metre cells and step into the courtyard where inmates were taken to get fresh air.
"This prison has legendary status and changed the conception of prisons. Now visitors will be able to get closer to its history," said park president Giampiero Sammuri.
He added that tours would cost around €30 (NZ$54).