Italian arrest over 'toxic wheat'

The head of Europe's biggest pasta mill has been arrested in the Italian city of Bari on food adulterating charges.

He is alleged to have attempted to sell 58,000 tonnes of durum wheat containing a powerful cancer-producing toxin.

Francesco Casillo, the 39-year-old head of a family-run group of wheat millers and grain importers, was arrested by customs police in Bari.

He has been charged with offering for sale adulterated food for both human and animal consumption.

Cancer fears

He is alleged to have tried to sell durum wheat, used in the manufacture of pasta, which was contaminated with a naturally occurring mould or fungus called ochratoxin, created by storage in unsuitably hot or humid conditions.

Police allege Mr Casillo's company imported a shipload of Canadian-grown durum wheat seized by authorities in Bari last year after laboratory tests showed toxic contamination three times above the level permitted under EU rules.

Police said ochratoxin was present in quantities likely to cause the growth of cancers in consumers of pasta made from this consignment of wheat.

Mr Casillo is alleged to have attempted to mix the durum wheat with other uncontaminated grain.

Mr Casillo's family company has so far made no comment on the arrest of its managing director.

The company is described on its website as the world's biggest private importer of durum wheat, producing from it a million tonnes a year of semolina which it sells to pasta manufacturers in Italy and many other countries.