A POLITICIAN has shocked Italians by proposing that immigrants be treated with the same severity the Nazis used when they occupied the country.

Giorgio Bettio, a city councillor in the northern city of Treviso, told a council meeting: “With immigrants, we should use the same system the SS used, punish ten of them for every slight against one of our citizens.”

That revived memories of the 1944 Ardeatine Caves massacre, when Hitler ordered that ten Italians be executed for each of the 33 German soldiers killed in an attack on occupying forces in a Rome street.

Immigration has been a burning issue in the rich northern Veneto region, where Treviso is located. Tensions have flared regularly between residents and immigrants, some of them seeking work in the area’s factories and fields.

Mr Bettio, a member of the anti-immigrant Northern League, was roundly condemned. Il Giornale, a newspaper that normally backs the Northern League, said in a front-page editorial: “Even if he was drunk or his brain short-circuited…he must be condemned without appeal.”

(12-07) 11:48 PST HOUSTON (AP) —

The number of rigs actively exploring for oil and natural gas in the United States rose by five this week to 1,828.

Of the rigs running nationwide, 1,482 were exploring for natural gas and 340 for oil, Houston-based Baker Hughes Inc. reported Friday. Six were listed as miscellaneous.

A year ago, the rig count stood at 1,724.

Of the major oil- and gas-producing states, New Mexico gained six rigs, while Colorado and Wyoming added three each. California, Louisiana and Oklahoma each lost two rigs, and Alaska and Texas were unchanged.

Baker Hughes has tracked rig counts since 1944. The tally peaked at 4,530 in 1981, during the height of the oil boom.

The industry posted several record lows in 1999, bottoming out at 488 rigs.

WASHINGTON: At least one thing is clear about President George W. Bushs plan to help people trapped by the mortgage meltdown: It is an industry-led plan, not a government bailout.

Although Bush unveiled the plan at the White House on Thursday, its terms were set by the mortgage industry and Wall Street banks. The effort is voluntary and it leaves plenty of wiggle room for lenders. Moreover, it would affect only a small number of subprime borrowers.

The plan was the target of criticism from consumer advocates, who said its scope was too narrow, and from investment firms, who said it went too far. Others warned that the plan, by letting some stretched homeowners off the hook, could encourage more reckless borrowing in the future.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson Jr., who hammered out the agreement, said the plan was not a “silver bullet.”

“We face a difficult problem for which there is no perfect solution,” he said.

The heart of Bushs plan is a cautious attempt to help troubled homeowners by persuading financiers to freeze mortgages at low introductory rates for five years, but without actually forcing the hands of lenders and investors who hold the mortgages.

One of the financial industrys lead negotiators estimated that at most 20 percent of subprime borrowers whose payments will increase sharply over the next 18 months - 360,000 out of 1.8 million people - would qualify for rapid consideration of a special five-year freeze on their interest rates.

The number of people who actually obtain that help would be smaller, because each borrower would face a battery of tests aimed at weeding out those who are considered too hopelessly in debt and those who make too much money to justify relief.

In one curious twist, the plan could eliminate many people who have good credit scores or who managed to improve their credit scores, because the good ratings would be a sign they did not need help.

“Talk about moral hazard,” said Representative Barney Frank, a Democrat of Massachusetts and the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. “Weve all told people, dont go any more deeply into debt. Now were saying that people who go more deeply into debt will have an advantage over people who dont go more deeply into debt.”

The administrations theory is that there is a “sweet spot” in the market where it makes more financial sense for lenders to offer some relief than it does to foreclose on homeowners.

Most analysts agree that there is indeed a sweet spot of some sort. Investors typically lose 40 percent or 50 percent on homes that go into foreclosure, and the cost of shielding borrowers from a big jump in rates can be much less than that.

“I think there is a sweet spot,” said Bert Ely, a banking consultant in Alexandria, Virginia. “But I worry that the sweet spot is much smaller than people think it is. And as housing prices continue to decline and debts pile up, I fear the sweet spot will shrink.”

Administration officials estimate that about 500,000 subprime borrowers are in danger of losing their houses in the next 18 months as their low teaser rates expire and their monthly payments jump by 30 percent or more. Outside analysts warn that the number of foreclosures could be much higher.

The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that the number of new foreclosure proceedings hit an all-time record in the third quarter, and that the delinquency rate on mortgages climbed to the highest level since 1986.

The biggest problem, according to the survey, was in subprime loans that are typically made at higher interest rates to people with shaky credit records or weak incomes. But Paulson and the presidents other top economic advisers have remained staunchly opposed to anything that resembled a government-funded bailout for people who took out what the advisers considered foolish mortgages or investors who bought the mortgages. As a result, administration officials have walked a narrow line.

They have held meetings that brought together mortgage-servicing companies with groups representing the investors who hold the mortgages. Instead of pressing the industry to come up with specific relief, Paulson has pushed the players to come up with a streamlined approach for deciding when to modify loan terms.

But Tom Deutsch, the deputy director of the American Securitization Forum, which represented investment funds in the negotiations, made it clear that any rate freeze would be strictly voluntary and based on what investors decided was in their self-interest.