Experiment in Eur business district aims to reduce the impact of a trade currently conducted on more than 20 streets in the neighbourhood

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

Rome has approved plans for a red light district where prostitution will be officially tolerated, officials have confirmed.

Ignazio Marino, the Italian capital’s centre-left mayor, gave his blessing on Friday evening to the experiment in the Eur business district, to the south of the city’s historic centre.

The council has proposed allowing prostitution in one non-residential area from April, with the aim of reducing the impact of a trade currently conducted on more than 20 streets in the district.

Police will be ordered to impose fines of up to €500 (£370) on sex workers caught touting for business outside the permitted area, which will be supervised.



If the experiment proves successful, the council wants to establish up to three separate red light areas in the district.

Cristina Lattanzi, a local resident who campaigned for the change, describing the current situation as a nightmare.

“Eur is already the city’s red light district with more than 20 streets under siege day and night,” she told La Repubblica. “There are streets for transvestites, streets for very young girls, streets for male prostitution. Us residents need a bit of peace.”

Objections to the initiative have been raised by the centre-right opposition on Rome’s municipal council, church figures and even some within Marino’s Democratic party (PD).

“I hope it is just a bizarre idea dreamed up to draw attention to the problem,” said PD councillor Gianluca Santilli, who argued that it would lead to unacceptable prostitute ghettos.

Enrico Feroci, the Rome director of the Catholic charity Caritas, said the initiative was morally wrong.

“Prostitution always involves human exploitation. Trying to regularise it or tolerate it is therefore always mistaken,” he said.

Italy has between 70,000 and 100,000 prostitutes, government and other researchers have estimated. Half are foreign nationals and two-thirds work on the streets.

Italian law does not ban the sale of sex but soliciting, pimping and operating a brothel are illegal.