A suspicious package that forced the evacuation of Rome's historic Colosseum on Sunday was destroyed but contained no explosives, authorities said.

The package, a metallic box wrapped in tape with a protruding wire, was destroyed at 1630 GMT after security forces had 90 minutes earlier evacuated visitors from the famed tourist attraction following a telephone bomb threat.

Archaeologists have unearthed a 2,000-year-old mosaic in Rome depicting the Greek god Apollo surrounded by his muses in a cellar once used as a park tool shed near the Colosseum, officials said on Friday.

"This is a very important discovery. The mosaic is in perfect condition and it can be dated exactly to between 64 and 109 AD," Umberto Broccoli, head of the culture department of the Rome city council, told reporters on a visit.

Winds of change are sweeping through the dusty palazzos and abandoned ruins of Italy -- as budget cuts in tough economic times force the managers of famous monuments to seek revenues and investment.

The crumbling Colosseum is being restored by shoe tycoon Diego Della Valle, the ancient Roman city of Pompeii is looking for private funders and the august royal residence of Venaria near Turin has opened its gates to banquets and fashion shows.

"Carthage Must Be Destroyed: The Rise and Fall of an Ancient Civilization" (Penguin Group), by Richard Miles: For ancient Romans, "Carthage Must Be Destroyed" had to be the wave of the future if they were to become the unrivaled masters of the Mediterranean and the lands on its shores. Look at a map.

Carthage, a colony of seagoing Phoenicians from what is now Lebanon, was strategically on the Mediterranean's south coast, halfway between its Middle East homeland and the entry to the Atlantic. It was building an empire of its own, subjecting tribes in North Africa, Spain and the big islands of Sicily, Sardinia and Corsica.

The World Bank on Monday pledged more than $500 million (348 million euros) to aid the drought-stricken Horn of Africa region, as United Nations aid chiefs met in Rome to discuss ramping up relief efforts.

The bulk of the money will go towards long-term projects to aid livestock farmers while $12 million will be for immediate assistance to those worst hit by the crisis and facing starvation, the World Bank said in a statement.

Private creditors and international banks were meeting in Rome on Thursday to discuss the role of the private sector in Greece's second debt bailout, an Italian Treasury source said.

The meeting was being held in order "to exchange points of view on the participation of private creditors," a source within the Treasury told Agence France Presse.

The Vatican is to unlock its secret archives for an exhibition on Rome's Capitol Hill next year, officials said Tuesday.

Documents including an account of the 17th century heresy trial of telescope inventor Galileo Galilei will leave the Holy See for the display entitled Lux in Arcana, opening in the city's Capitoline Museums in February.

Arab bankers painted a sobering picture of the economic results of political upheaval in their region at a conference in Rome, saying tourism has plunged and capital flight is on the rise.

Capital flight is running into the hundreds of millions of dollars (euros) per week and budget stability is under pressure as governments are forced to increase subsidies and salaries to keep social stability, they said.

Pope Benedict XVI on Saturday congratulated Lebanon on the formation of Premier Najib Miqati’s cabinet and expressed hope that all the countries in the region would live in peace.

Benedict told Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi that he hoped the government would “succeed since Lebanon is facing great challenges whether due to the local economic crisis” or regional events.

Around 100 people have occupied a historic Italian theater where Luigi Pirandello's "Six Characters in Search of an Author" was first performed to protest plans to convert the landmark into a restaurant.

The Valle, which opened in the 18th century and was the site of Pirandello's famous opening in 1921, is Rome's oldest active theatre.