3 21 2013 93230 l - Italian athletics great Mennea dead
MILAN: Italian athletics great Pietro Mennea, the gold medal winner in the 200m at the 1980 Moscow Olympics, has died, according to ANSA news agency.

He also held the 200 m world record for 17 years with his time of 19.72.

Mennea was a member of the European Parliament from 1999 to 2004 elected on the list of The Democrats, but failed in his attempt to be re-elected.


He died in a Rome hospital as a result of a long battle with an as yet unnamed incurable disease. He was 60.