Italians shoot African man in latest anti-immigrant attack

Three Italian boys shot an African man in the foot with lead pellets from an air gun, local media reported Thursday.

The incident took place Wednesday in the town of Aprilia south of Rome, but wasn't reported until Thursday.

Carabinieri military police identified the three -- a 19-year-old and two minors -- and cited them for aggravated bodily harm.

The boys claimed they were testing the gun near a window in their home when it accidentally went off, wounding the man who was walking in the street below, according to RAI public broadcaster.

La Stampa newspaper said the victim is from the central African country of Cameroon and that he was hospitalized with a five-day prognosis.

The incident was the latest in a string of non-fatal shootings that began shortly before national elections in March, when Italian citizen Luca Traini went on an anti-immigrant shooting rampage in the central city of Macerata, wounding six people with live bullets before giving himself up.

In 2017, Traini had run for local office as a candidate for the rightwing League party whose leader, Matteo Salvini, is now the deputy prime minister and interior minister of Italy.

In the southern city of Caserta in June, two asylum seekers from Mali were shot by three Italian men in a car who reportedly shouted "Salvini, Salvini" while aiming at them with an air gun.

In July, a man from the Ivory Coast and a Nigerian woman where shot with an air gun in two separate incidents in the northern city of Forli. Both victims were fired at while walking down the street, one from a moving car and the other from a scooter, according to La Repubblica newspaper.

Also last month, police cited three Italian men in their early 20s for bodily harm aggravated by racial hatred after they shot two Nigerian asylum seekers with an air gun in the town of Latina near Rome, TGcom24 private broadcaster reported.

In the same month, an Italian man in Rome shot a little girl from the minority Roma ethnic group with a pellet gun, injuring her spine and leaving her at risk of paralysis. He also claimed the gun went off accidentally.

The incident prompted President Sergio Mattarella to call on politicians to combat the spread of racism and prejudice in the country, which was at risk of "becoming like the Wild West".

Earlier this month, two 13-year-old boys in the Tuscan city of Pistoia shot blanks at a young man from Gambia while shouting racist slurs. The incident was first denounced on Facebook by local priest Massimo Biancalani, who runs a center for asylum seekers and who reported the incident to police.

The kids admitted to police that they shot at the victim, who was jogging, because "they wanted to scare him", according to ANSA news agency.