GOMA, DR
Congo
Italy’s ambassador to Democratic Republic of Congo was killed on Monday along with his bodyguard and a World Food Programme driver when their convoy was attacked in the east of the country, Italy and the United Nations said.
The assailants stopped
the convoy by firing warning shots, killed the Congolese driver and were
leading the passengers into the forest when park rangers opened fire, the
governor of North Kivu province, Carly Nzanzu Kasivita, told our reporter.
The Italian ambassador,
Luca Attanasio, 43, was hit in the abdomen and died several hours later at the
U.N. hospital in the regional capital Goma, Congo’s interior ministry said.
Italy said Attanasio’s
bodyguard Vittorio Iacovacci, 30, also died in the attack. The driver was named
by a security source and local rights activists as Mustapha Milambo.
“It was with great shock and immense sorrow that I learned of the death today of our Ambassador to the Democratic Republic of Congo and of a Carabinieri policeman,” Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said in a statement.
“The circumstances of
this brutal attack are still unclear and no effort will be spared to shed light
on what happened.”
There was no immediate
claim of responsibility. Congo’s interior ministry blamed a Hutu militia called
the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR).
It is one of dozens of
armed groups operating in and around Virunga National Park, which lies along
Congo’s borders with Rwanda and Uganda and is home to more than half the
world’s mountain gorillas.
The FDLR, founded by
members of the militia behind the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, kidnapped two
British tourists in the same village in May 2018, leading the park to close to
tourists for nine months. The couple were released after several days.
“I promise the Italian
government that my country’s government will do everything to discover who is
behind this awful murder,” Congo’s foreign minister Marie Ntumba Nzeza said.
The convoy was attacked
at about 10:15 a.m. (0815 GMT) some 25 km (15 miles) north of Goma, a spokesman
for the Virunga National Park told Reuters. Local civil society member Mambo
Kawaya said it happened in the village of Rurimba.
The U.N.’s World Food Programme (WFP) said the delegation was on its way to visit a school feeding programme in Rutshuru. It said the road had previously been cleared for travel without security escorts.
Photos shared on social media showed Attanasio lying in the arms of a man in a park authority jeep and the broken window of a WFP vehicle. Reuters has not verified the images.
Italy’s foreign
ministry website said Attanasio had been its head of mission in Congo’s capital
Kinshasa since 2017 and was made ambassador in 2019. He was married and had
three young daughters, according to his Facebook page.
“He was an enthusiastic
young diplomat with a great sensitivity to social problems,” said Mauro
Garofolo at the Sant’Egidio charity based in Rome. “He closely followed our
work such as our programme to help HIV/AIDS sufferers.”
The driver, Milambo,
leaves behind four children, said Jean-Mobert Senga, a Congolese rights
activist.
“(He) joins thousands
of Congolese who have lost their lives in this region, including on this road,
and whose tragedies rarely make the headlines and comments from politicians in
Kinshasa,” he said on Twitter. - Reuters
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