TOBIACH, Italy, Dec 13 (Reuters) - Three women Nordic skiers have failed dope tests carried out during World Cup races in northern Italy, news agency ANSA reported on Sunday.

It said the three, two Norwegians and a Ukranian, were found to have higher-than-permitted levels of red blood cells in a test carried out on Saturday morning in Tobiach.

They did not compete in Saturday's five-km cross-country event.

It said all three women were found to have haematocrit levels of above 16.5, the highest level permitted by the International Ski Federation.

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MILAN, Italy (AP) - Primo Nebiolo, president of track and field's governing body, wants a uniform anti-drug program that will encompass all sports worldwide.

Nebiolo, who touched off a controversy last month when he pointed to tennis, cycling and volleyball as sports that refused to sign an Olympic accord unifying anti-drug programs, said all sports federations should join the effort.

Nebiolo made the comments in a letter to Italy's largest sports daily newspaper, Gazzetta dello Sport.

"We must work out new measures for blocking this dangerous moral drift," the letter said.

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'There Are Risks Inherent In Relapse To Heroin Intake Following Abstinence From The Drug'

Respiratory suppression after heroin overdose is the most common cause of death among heroin users, but the reasons why some users have a higher risk of death than others are unclear.

Morphine, the main active metabolite of heroin, is deposited in the hair of heroin users, and analysis of hair samples can show the history of addiction over several months.

Franco Tagliaro and colleagues obtained hair samples from 37 heroin overdose fatalities, 37 active heroin users, 37 former heroin users, and 20 non-users from Verona, Italy. The researchers found that the hair of the overdose-fatality cases contained much less morphine than that of the active heroin users, suggesting virtual abstinence from the drug in the months preceding death.

Low heroin tolerance following abstinence may lead to a corresponding decrease in the size of a fatal dose. These findings have implications for the future management of detoxification programmes.



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ITALY'S institutions, and especially its police, yesterday gloated over the re-arrest of Pasquale Cuntrera, the Mafia drugs baron whose disappearance in a wheelchair triggered a political storm last week.

Cuntrera, 63, was caught with his wife by Italian and local agents near Malaga in Spain, 18 days after vanishing from Italy. He disappeared after walking free on a technicality from Parma prison, days before a supreme court decision to uphold his 21-year sentence.

News of his release on May 6 was faxed to Sicilian magistrates, who should have ordered his re-arrest pending the imminent court decision. But for five days the fax sat unseen on someone's desk. When it was finally noticed, Cuntrera, dubbed European's number one drugs boss, had already fled Italy.

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ROME (AP) -- In a nationwide sweep, Italian police arrested 21 people on charges of money laundering and criminal association, according to a media report Wednesday.

No figures were available, but the AGI news agency said a ``huge'' amount of money was involved. It said the money reportedly came from a vast arms and drug trafficking ring involving Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Montecarlo, as well as Italy.

AGI said the police investigation began in Florence last September. Another 57 people are reportedly under investigation, it said.

[end]

NPR's Tom Gjelten profiles Pino Arlacchi, who took charge o the United Nations Drug Control Program in September and says he intends to stop worldwide production of illegal cocaine and opium within 10 years. He wants to begin in Afghanistan, where the Taliban relies on cultivation of coca plants and poppies for much of its revenue. Arlacchi's goal is considered overly ambitious, but he says it can be attained. He earned his crimefighting reputation as director of a special antiMafia task force in Italy.

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Pannella, founder of the Radical Party and now leader of the Pannella List party, gave away what his aides estimated was $85,000 on Friday as most of the city was deserted for a national holiday.

Thousands lined up in the square outside Rome's city hall atop the Capitoline Hill to receive a 50,000lire ($28) note.

Last month, Pannella, who's been nicknamed Robin Hood, gave away $110,000 in northern Italy.

The giveaways with three more planned for northern Italy in coming weeks are part of his campaign to reform the financing of political parties.

Pannella has used stunts before to make his point. Several years ago, he distributed free marijuana at a Roman flea market to get publicity for his campaign to legalize the drug.

[end]

By THOMAS H. MAUGH II Los Angeles Times letters@latimes.com

In a finding sure to add fuel to the debate over the medical and recreational use of marijuana, two new studies released today strongly suggest pot is a "gateway" drug that leads some people on to abuse of socalled hard drugs, such as cocaine and heroin.

One study in Science magazine, produced by a team at the Scripps Research Institute in San Diego, demonstrates that the stress and anxiety associated with withdrawal from longterm use of marijuana produce the same biochemical changes associated with withdrawal from the harder drugs. This is the "negative reinforcement" that causes a person to take more drugs to alleviate the stress.

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NAPLES, Italy (Reuter) A former CIA agent and 64 other people, including financiers from across Europe, will stand trial as part of an investigation into an international crime ring, Italian state prosecutors said Wednesday.

Alfredo Ormanni, chief prosecutor of the southern town of Torre Annunziata, near Naples, said former U.S. Central Intelligence Agency officer Roger d'Onofrio and the others would face charges of money laudering, false accounting and producing fake government bonds, which were distributed throughout Europe.

The date for the first hearing was not immediately known.

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ROME, May 12 (Reuter) Police arrested eight Albanians on Monday on charges of smuggling marijuana with a street value of some $34 million into Italy by boat.

Police said they found the drugs when they intercepted at least six boats bringing illegal immigants to Italy on the southeastern coast between the towns of Brindisi and Lecce.

Nearly 580 kilos (1,300 lb) of the drug were seized on different vessels. A further 126 Albanian illegal immigrants were detained in the operation and were likely to be sent home.

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ROME, April 27 (Reuter) Italian customs police said on Sunday they had seized 638 kg (1,400 pounds) of marijuana from an Albanian motor boat that landed near Santa Maria di Leuca on the southern Adriatic coast.

Saturday's find brought the amount of marijuana seized in 10 days along the coast near Lecce, southern Italy, to almost 1.6 tonnes, police said.

The haul was the biggest on record in the area and the boat's crew was arrested, they said.

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