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UPDATE 1-Explosive devices found at Fiat, union buildings

(Adds police comment, background about threats)

MILAN, July 29 (Reuters) - A crude bomb was found outside the Milan headquarters of carmaker Fiat on Monday and another was discovered outside a labour union building near the city, police said.

The devices, neither of which exploded, were found amid renewed concern about terrorism in Italy where an economist working on controversial labour reforms was shot dead in March.

Police were at Fiat's headquarters in a Milan suburb where an employee of a Fiat dealership found the device, Marco Rizzo, a colonel with Italy's carabinieri police force told Reuters.

"We still can't be sure why it didn't go off," although a timer appeared to have been set for later on Monday, he said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the device which comprised a paint tin with a camping gas cylinder inside and a timer attached.

Fiat, Italy's biggest private sector employer, is planning to lay off about 3,000 workers in an effort to curb growing losses at a time of slumping car sales.

The second device was found outside an office of labour union CISL -- the most centrist of Italy's three big trade union groups -- in Monza, a suburb of Milan.

The killing of economist Marco Biagi in Bologna in March has raised fears that other attacks could follow.

An offshoot of the radical left-wing Red Brigades group, active in Italy during the 1970s and 1980s, claimed responsibility for that attack.

Fiat along with two local newspapers and a television station recently received letters and emails threatening union officials and politicians.

Some of the letters were signed in the name of a chapter of the Red Brigades.