Italy 'will not give in to kidnappers'
Italy will not bow to the kidnappers of two Italian aid workers in Iraq who are demanding that it withdraw its forces from Iraq, an Italian envoy said today.
“We will not change our foreign policy unless the UN or a new Iraqi government” asks foreign troops leave, Margherita Boniver, Italy’s Foreign Ministry under-secretary, told reporters in Damascus, the Syrian capital.
“Not one Italian soldier will stay on Iraqi soil for one second if the elected government of Iraq says that we must go,” added Boniver, who is travelling in the Middle East to try secure the release of the two Italian women seized last Tuesday from their aid agency’s Baghdad offices by armed militants.
Italian troops, she stressed, were in Iraq to help build the country: “They are not there for war.”
Boniver arrived in Damascus late on Friday from Jordan on a regional mission seeking help in securing the release of Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, both 29. They work for the aid agency “Un Ponte Per …” (“A Bridge To…”) and were involved in school and water projects in Iraq.
Un Ponte Per… has been critical of Italian Open Silvio Berlusconi’s support of the US-led invasion of Iraq.
Italy has 3,500 troops in Iraq, where at least five Italians have been abducted since April, including two who have been killed.
Boniver said her government has not established “any concrete contacts” with the abductors.
Addressing the kidnappers, she said: “What you have done totally runs contrary to the culture and religion of this land. Please let these two young women free.”
The abductions, she said, had shocked Italy: “We are in total anguish.”
Later, she left for Sana’a, Yemen.
