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    Minister: Kidnapped Italian aid worker OK

    Updated: 2005-05-18 10:32

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


    An Afghan widow who receives monthly ration from CARE International aid agency, weeps as she holds a photograph of Italian aid worker Clementina Cantoni in Kabul May 17, 2005. [Reuters]

    "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.

    When reporters asked Fini if the kidnappers had asked for ransom in exchange for the woman's release, he replied: "It's a question on which utmost reserve, discretion and prudence are obligatory to reach the objective."

    Earlier, a top aide to Fini, Ministry Undersecretary Margherita Boniver, told Sky TG24 that "the most accredited hypothesis about the kidnappers is that of common criminals."

    The kidnappers let authorities hear a recording of Cantoni's voice over the telephone, the Italian news agency ANSA reported late 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.

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

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

    Cantoni has been engaged in humanitarian work for 10 years, the aid group said. She has lived in Afghanistan since March 2002, leading a project helping thousands of Afghan widows and their families.

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

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

    Sergio Marelli, president of an association of Italian non-governmental organizations, 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.

    At least eight Italian citizens have been kidnapped in Iraq, and two of them were killed. An intelligence officer who was escorting a hostage to freedom was mistakenly killed by U.S. soldiers in Baghdad in March.

    Italy's handling of the hostage situations has come under scrutiny, with many at home and abroad contending that Rome paid ransoms 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.

    Some analysts said Italians might be at greater risk of being abducted because of the government's perceived policy of paying ransoms.

    "Wherever extremism is active, we are always the more appealing and more exposed ones," La Stampa wrote. "Maybe the moment has come to limit the presence of Italians in crisis zones to the few activities that are really indispensable."



     
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