'The truth will never emerge'

2005-05-03 07:58

Rome - Italian investigators blamed United States military authorities for failing to signal there was a checkpoint ahead on the Baghdad road where American soldiers killed an Italian agent, and concluded in a report that stress, inexperience and fatigue played a role in the shooting.

The investigators found no evidence, however, that the March 4 killing of intelligence agent Nicola Calipari was deliberate. The Italians also didn't object to many of the findings of fact contained in a separate American report made public on Saturday.

Still, they refused to sign off on the US conclusion that the soldiers bore no blame for Calipari's death, and the two sides issued separate reports after a joint investigation.

The Italians contended that the whole truth about the shooting would never emerge.

Vehicles were moved

The Italian report, written by a diplomat and a general assigned to Italy's secret services and released on Monday, said no measures were taken by US officials to preserve the scene of the shooting. It said the car carrying Sgrena and the agents was removed before its position was marked, for example. The soldiers' vehicles also were moved.

It also noted that an Italian general was denied access to the shooting site immediately after the slaying, and that duty logs were destroyed after the soldiers' shifts.

That assessment could fuel calls by Italians, who largely opposed the war in Iraq, for conservative Premier Silvio Berlusconi to end the deployment of the country's own troops there.

Calipari was hailed as a hero in Italy.

Less than an hour before the shooting, the veteran SISMI secret services agent had secured the release of an Italian hostage, journalist Giuliana Sgrena. The two were in the back seat of the Toyota Corolla and another intelligence agent was driving them to the airport for a flight to Rome when they were shot at.

Sgrena and the driver survived their wounds, and some of their testimony clashed with the US military version of the shooting, including over whether there was adequate warning and the speed of the car.

The US military, in a report made public on Saturday, said the American soldiers gave enough warning, beaming a light and firing warning shots as the car approached.

The Italians concluded that: "It is likely that the state of tension stemming from the conditions of time, circumstances and place, as well as possibly some degree of inexperience and stress might have led some soldiers to instinctive and little controlled reactions."

The US report, in a portion that was blacked out in the version made public on Saturday, said the checkpoint had been the site of 13 attacks between November 1 2004, and early March 2005.

The driver has testified that he knew the area very well and that no roadblock had been on the highway, when he and Calipari drove out of the airport on their way to pick up Sgrena only hours before the shooting.

- AP