We've been following Italy's troubles with maintaining the Colosseum for a while, and according to the Times of Oman, the government is increasingly looking to private investors to help preserve its cultural heritage.
Billionaire Diego Della Valle has reportedly said he might pull his promised $33 million to restore the Colosseum following union protests and investigations into the project. Fragments of the 2,000-year-old Roman amphitheater, now at the center of a busy road junction and blackened with pollution, have begun falling down and the restoration project's start date of March is looking increasingly unlikely.
Meanwhile, at the archaeological site of Pompeii near Naples, which has also been hit by a series of alarming collapses in recent months, the long-mooted prospect of bringing in private investors is still a distant prospect.
The government has promised to unblock $138 million in funding from the European Union for a four-year maintenance plan and to increase the number of archaeologists at the site from just one person currently employed there.