Misled by a letter

Italy's deputy economics minister, Gianfranco Miccichè, has got into a spot of bother after his biography on the ministry website described him as a postgraduate lecturer at the University of Reggio Calabria. Mr Miccichè is not a graduate, let alone a university lecturer. The minister later explained away the episode by showing a letter written to him by a friend at the university asking him to come and teach a course. Admittedly, Mr Miccichè has never actually taught there, but, he explained, an over-zealous underling must have seen the letter lying around and added the lectureship to his biography.