Posted on 09/24/2004 5:42:52 PM PDT by Toonces T. Cat
Has there been any further word regarding the status of the two Italian women? I have been wearing out the carpet praying for them since the post earlier today, but have not heard anything either on the net or out of Centcom.
Coalition Forces Catch Italian Women's Captors ^
The post linked above states that their captors had been captured by Coalition Forces, but does not say one way or the other about the young ladies.
Please forgive me for the vanity, but if anyone hears anything, please let know about it. I try not to take this stuff so personally, but I cannot halp myself in this case.
Thanks!
-Toonces
-Toonces
I heard on ABC News today during the break in the Rush Limbaugh program, and this is not confirmed, but I heard that they fear the women have been beheaded.
ROME, Italy (CNN) -- The Italian government has urged caution on reports that two Italian women being held captive in Iraq have been killed, saying the claims are "unreliable" and part of a terrorism campaign being carried out through the media.
"We, therefore, urge the maximum caution, care and responsibility," the office of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said in a news release Thursday.
Simona Torretta and Simona Pari, both age 29, were working for a humanitarian group called Bridge to Baghdad when their office was raided by insurgents more than two weeks ago and they were taken hostage, police said.
An Islamic Web site that has proven to be unreliable in the past first posted a claim from an unknown group late Wednesday that the two women had been killed.
Then on Thursday, another group claimed to have killed the women, in a message posted on multiple Islamic Web sites used by Iraqi terrorists in the past.
The group -- calling itself the Al-Zawahiri Supporters Group, named after Osama bin Laden's No. 2 man, Ayman al-Zawahiri -- claimed the women worked for Italian intelligence and were killed because Italy refused to withdraw its 2,700 troops from Iraq.
"We decided to behead the spy Italians," the message said, adding it hopes to soon show video of the killings.
This group was also one of a couple groups that initially claimed to have taken the women captive on September 7. In the past, it has claimed responsibility for attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq and claimed responsibility for participating in bombings of embassies in Iraq.
CNN has been unable to verify the claims made concerning the two Italian women.
Speaking at the Italian Mission in New York, Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said, "We are trying to verify the reliability of the claims. It's being conducted in an in-depth fashion. ... We remain cautious."
He added, "Everything in our possibility will be done in order to obtain the release of these two hostages. So, I cannot fill in details on that. It is a very delicate moment."
The news of the women's possible deaths -- even if the claims were murky -- gripped much of the nation. "We want to hope," read the headline of one newspaper.
Outside Torretta's residence, where supporters have gathered since the first few days of the womens' captivity, the mood was somber.
"The latest news that we've got, it seems like it's getting worse," Daniele Romano told APTN.
The claims of the killings came after a gruesome week for Western hostages, in which a separate group beheaded two Americans and threatened to kill a British hostage it holds.
The humanitarian group that the two women worked for began operating in Iraq at the end of the first Gulf War in 1991 with the goal of lifting the U.N. embargo against Iraq.
Torretta had been in Iraq for at least a year, and Pari arrived just a few months ago. Both worked on a UNICEF-linked project to help rebuild schools.
For what it's worth, these scumbags lie to their captives about other captives, to us, to the World and each other. So, there's still a chance they are alive.
No.
Thank you for bringing up the subject, Cat. I've been thinking about them, too.
Ditto!
Flash - Arab TV news reports that two of the terrorists who abducted the Italian women have been arrested.
I know...:-)
That's what the linked post from this afternoon refers to. I want to know if there is any word about the girls themselves.
-Toonces
Anybody gives you any sh*t, I got your back.
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