'A new nightmare for Italy'

2005-05-18 07:49

Rome - Italy's foreign minister says an Italian aid worker taken hostage in Afghanistan is all right, as he tried to reassure an anguished nation over its latest abduction drama.

"We know that she is well because the kidnappers have initiated a channel of contacts with the Afghan authorities," Foreign Minister Gianfranco Fini told reporters about efforts to win the freedom of Care International worker Clementina Cantoni, who was abducted in Kabul on Monday.

The kidnappers let authorities hear a recording of Cantoni's voice over the telephone, the Italian news agency Ansa reported late on Tuesday. In the recording, Cantoni says her name and gave personal details which were verified, Ansa cited intelligence officials as saying.

Italy was in anguish over the kidnapping, the latest abduction drama to hit the country after several of its citizens were held hostage in Iraq.

8 citizens kidnapped

"A new nightmare begins for all of us, and a new long phase of negotiations (begins) for the government," Italian daily La Stampa wrote on Tuesday.

Cantoni, 32, was abducted by four men Monday evening, the first kidnapping of a foreigner in Afghanistan since three United Nations election workers were seized in October and held for nearly a month.

Earlier in the day, Fini, who called the hostage's family in Milan, promised that "no efforts will be spared."

Cantoni had done humanitarian work for 10 years, the aid group said. In Afghanistan, where she has lived since March 2002, Cantoni led a project helping thousands of Afghan widows and their families.

Italian newspapers on Tuesday described her as a combative woman with an ironic wit, who worked relentlessly for the needy. She worked in Bulgaria and Kosovo after her studies in London and before heading to Afghanistan, the reports said.

"She's a no-nonsense person, very determined, with solid experience," La Repubblica daily quoted longtime friend Giuseppe Mastruzzo as saying.

Sergio Marelli, the president of an association of Italian NGOs, said that with the kidnapping "it seems like we've returned to a nightmare."

"This brings us dramatically back to the reality that working in areas where there had been war brings these extreme consequences," he said.

Italy has had at least eight of its citizens kidnapped in Iraq, two of whom have been killed.

Rome's handling of its hostages has come under scrutiny, with many at home and abroad contending that Italy has paid ransom for their release. Premier Silvio Berlusconi's government has denied in the past that a ransom was paid, but some lawmakers have indicated money might have changed hands.

In Afghanistan, General Jamil Jumbesh, head of the Interior Ministry's anti-terrorism division, said that a gang of "thieves" had claimed responsibility for the kidnapping.

The Italian ambassador in Kabul, Ettore Francesco Sequi said that Italian authorities had not received any ransom request.

- AP