Officials in the northern Italian town of Coccaglio are visiting the homes of foreign residents and expelling those with expired residency permits. The initiative, which is called "White Christmas," has caused a national uproar, but city officials claim their words have been taken out of context.

An initiative dubbed "White Christmas" to check the residency status of immigrants in a small town in northern Italy has created an uproar. While some city officials defend the action as a census with merely a poorly chosen title, others see it as another in a long chain of events revealing the growing power of Italian xenophobia.

The "White Christmas" initiative was launched on Oct. 25 in Coccaglio, a town of fewer than 7,000 people about an hour's drive east of Milan, in Lombardy. As part of the campaign, city officials are going to the homes of about 400 of the town's roughly 1,500 foreigners between now and Dec. 25 to check their immigration status papers. The majority of these immigrants are from Morocco, Albania and the former Yugoslavia. According to Italian daily La Repubblica, those who are found with residence permits that expired six months ago or earlier will be expelled if they cannot prove that they attempted to renew them.

The city's town council, which is controlled by three members of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's conservative People of Freedom party and four members of the right-wing and anti-immigrant Northern League, including Mayor Franco Claretti, chose the English title "White Christmas" from the famous Bing Crosby song of the same name.