Milan will not hold its traditional New Year’s Eve celebration in Piazza Duomo this year, with the city confirming that no concert or public countdown will be staged.
Mayor Giuseppe Sala attributes the decision to the upcoming 2026 Winter Olympics, noting that a significant portion of the square is already taken up with preparations for the Games due to commence on Feb. 6.
“The square is 30 percent full for the Olympics, plus there’s the Christmas tree and the Olympic timer in Piazzetta Reale, so it can’t happen this year,” Sala said, adding that the administration intends to restore the event next year.
The cancellation comes after several high-profile sexual assaults in Piazza Duomo during celebrations in recent years, which have brought the city into disrepute. There is no formal suggestion that the cancellation is due to these attacks, but it is clear that the city cannot afford any bad press in the lead-up to the Games.
New Year’s festivities in and around Piazza Duomo were overshadowed last year by sexual assaults involving groups of young migrants targeting women in the crowd, including tourists. Six Belgian students reported being sexually assaulted by up to 30 to 40 men in the city’s main square.
“We were harassed there. They touched us over our clothes, but also underneath,” one of the victims, Laura, told Belgian news site 7s7 days after the attack. “Three of us, including myself, were sexually assaulted. They put their hands in my underwear. It went way too far.”
She described the event as a “night of terror,” noting how she and her friends were surrounded by adult males waving flags of countries such as Iraq, Pakistan, and the United Arab Emirates, and how her group of friends felt “powerless in the face of so much violence.”
Another widely reported case in 2023 saw nine women attacked, with police later identifying 18 suspects, including foreigners from North Africa between the ages of 15 and 21, three of whom were minors, but also North Africans with Italian citizenship.
“We tried to fend them off, my friend hit and slapped them, but they laughed and continued to harass us, I had 15 hands on me,” one of the victims, from Mannheim, Germany, told the ANSA news agency, adding: “At some point, I fell to the ground, and they kept putting their hands on us.”
“We were surrounded by a group of people. They all spoke Arabic. We cried and screamed for help, but no one helped us. There were 30 people around us, touching us everywhere, nobody spoke Italian and unfortunately also no English when we managed to get out of there,” she added.
Although the mayor has framed this year’s cancellation as a matter of space and logistics, the absence of large-scale festivities removes the potential for any negative press only weeks before global attention turns to Milan.
Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini criticized the decision, arguing that an Olympic year deserved a public celebration. He suggested that Milan should have hosted a cultural performance — such as a Filarmonica della Scala concert — rather than leaving the square unused.
“The world will look at Milan on Feb. 6 and wonder what events will be held in Piazza Duomo: whether there will be any quality events, not a concert by rapper Maranza. I don’t see any,” he said.
The post Italy: Milan will have no New Year’s Eve celebrations this year ahead of February’s Winter Olympics: a matter of logistics or an attempt to avoid unwanted headlines? appeared first on Remix News.
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