Balaclava-clad gangs, some wearing bandanas emblazoned with swastikas, smashed shop windows with iron bars and baseball bats and beat up shopkeepers in a hitherto bohemian neighbourhood of Rome.

Members of the gangs shouted “Get out, bastard foreigners” as they attacked Bengali shopkeepers in the explosion of xenophobic violence.

Gianni Alemanno, the capital’s new right-wing Mayor, condemned the attacks, which took place in the eastern suburb of Pigneto, an area with a reputation for tolerance, on Saturday night.

Local residents also condemned the violence, saying that it must have been perpetrated by outsiders. One shopkeeper, however, said he had recognised one of the youths, who earlier had accused him of harbouring a fellow Asian who had allegedly stolen a purse.

Opponents blamed the new centre-right Government for allowing what they described as a climate of xeno-phobia to flourish across the country.

The new Government of Silvio Berlusconi last week announced a crackdown on illegal immigration and street crime at a Cabinet meeting held in Naples. Roberto Maroni, the Interior Minister, who is deputy leader of the antiimmigrant Northern League, said that the Government was responding to the concern of Italians over immigration and personal security.

He said that the Government condemned vigilante attacks on immigrants, including arson attacks on Roma Gypsy camps.

At last week’s Cabinet meeting Mr Berlusconi said he would use the army to resolve the Naples rubbish crisis and threatened that anyone obstructing the construction of rubbish dumps would be arrested and imprisoned. Thousands of protesters defied Mr Berlusconi at the weekend and clashed with police trying to open a landfill site in the Naples suburb of Chiaiano.

Several protesters were injured as police made baton charges and fired tear gas. Six police officers were also injured. There were seven arrests.

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