Verified news needed - Mattarella at ANSA 80th birthday show

(ANSA) - ROME, JAN 15 - Verified news is needed now more than ever, President Sergio Mattarella told an exhibition of photos in Rome Wednesday marking ANSA's 80th anniversary as Italy's premier news agency.
    "In the chaos of information there is an ever-increasing need for verified content, the work of journalists is fundamental", the head of State said as he visited the photographic exhibition at the MAXXI modern art museum created by ANSA on the occasion of the agency's 80th anniversary, which recounts the life of the Republic and the major events that have shaken the world through a series of shots of great visual impact.
    Mattarella, after a brief ceremony in the rooms of the Rome museum that will host the exhibition until February 9, spent a long time looking at the photographs accompanied by the President of ANSA Giulio Anselmi, CEO Stefano De Alessandri and Editor-in-Chief Luigi Contu.
    The preview of the exhibition and the meeting with the President of the Republic were also attended by the members of ANSA's board, which features as partners Italy's major newspapers.
    "Congratulations for your work, a work, that of journalists, which is fundamental for democracy,' added Mattarella while looking at an iconic photo of Tiananmen Square.
    "A highly symbolic photo for freedom,' he commented.
    The president was also struck by the photos of former centre-left leader Romano Prodi and his great rival Silvio Berlusconi mounted on a panel one above the other: it was "a little mean" to put them together like that, he wryly observed.
    Shortly before, Anselmi thanked Mattarella "for the attention he uninterruptedly reserves for information as a guarantee of democracy," underlining precisely "the watchdog role that ANSA has always had and that it wants to continue to exercise" also given that, unfortunately, "many confuse information with propaganda." De Alessandri illustrated the great work of digitizing the historical archive of ANSA in the analogical part that goes from 1945 to 1990.
    "We were losing this part of our history, it is about a million photos that we will proceed to digitize in the next three years".
    An important work, which aims to safeguard images that are a heritage of Italy, made possible by an agreement with Intesa Sanpaolo.
    "We are a bank but also a great social operator", explained Gian Maria Gros-Pietro, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Italy's biggest bank.
    "We also believe in the value of history and for this reason we have enthusiastically welcomed" the possibility of helping ANSA.
    "I thank the agency," said Gros-Pietro, "for being a beacon of documentation of the truth, a bulwark against fake news, a safe reference for our country". (ANSA).