Former Italian president, prime minister Ciampi dies

Former Italian president, prime minister and central bank governor Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, who played a key role in guiding the country into the European single currency, has died, the government said on Friday.

He was 95 and had been ill for some time.

One of Italy's most respected figures on the international stage, Ciampi helped steer the country through the dark days of corruption scandals in the 1990s and persuaded skeptical EU allies that the economy was fit to join the euro.

"One of our fathers has left us. If Italy is (still) a great country then we owe an enormous debt of gratitude to Ciampi," former prime minister Enrico Letta wrote on Twitter.

Jean-Claude Juncker, the president of the European Commission, wrote: "Today, we have lost a great Italian and a great European." Pope Francis praised Ciampi's "gentlemanly discretion and great sense of duty".

While tributes flowed in from across Europe, the head of the anti-EU Northern League party struck a discordant note, denouncing Ciampi for the crucial role he had played in making sure Italy was part of the euro from its birth in 1999.

"Politically speaking, Ciampi is one of the traitors of Italy," Matteo Salvini told Sky Italia TV.

"He carries on his conscience the disaster that has befallen 50 million Italians," said Salvini, who regularly rails against the euro, arguing that a loss of monetary independence has brought years of economic misery to Italy.

Ciampi spent most of his working life at the Bank of Italy, which he joined in 1946 after the Second World War when he fought with the Italian partisans against Mussolini. During his 14 years as its head, the Bank was freed from political control, winning leeway to set interest rates and exchange rate policy.

He often said he expected to retire when he left the central bank but in 1993, with Italy mired in the corruption scandals of “"Tangentopoli" (Bribesville), Ciampi was persuaded to become prime minister to stave off crisis.