Italy strikes perfectly timed to take in Euro 2016

Hundreds of flights were cancelled and many more were delayed across Italy on Friday during a brief strike by air traffic controllers... just as Italy were beating Sweden in the Euro 2016 football tournament.

Ministers had tried to head off the strike over pension plans, but a court had given it the green light following a notice filed by two unions.

At 1pm (1100 GMT), just two hours before the match kicked off in the southern French city of Toulouse, many air traffic controllers walked off the job.

They came back to work at 5pm, just after the final whistle sounded in a group E match which Italy won 1-0.

On Monday, bus and metro services in Rome slowed to a trickle following a similar strike during the national team’s match against Belgium, which Italy won 2-0.

But the country hasn't ground to a complete halt because of the tournament.

According to the AGI news agency, a man whom police had been seeking for more than a year after being sentenced to nine years behind bars over his Mafia connections was arrested on Friday as he watched the opening match of Euro 2016.