Know what is fascinating, one of the first reports, I believe it was even the Reuters report, indicated this woman had been wounded prior to her rescue and one of the reasons the Special Ops guy was in a hurry was to get her to medical attention fast, so much for her "sensitive" captors
funny how the latest articles don't mention that.....
Responding to the calls "Liberiamo la pace" (Let's free peace) and "Giuliana: una di noi" (Giuliana: one of us), on Saturday February 19, after a week of local demonstrations held all over Italy, half a million people converged in Rome from all over Italy to march and rally for the release of Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena, her French colleague Florence Aubenas and her translator Hussein, and the pull out of Italian troops from Iraq.
The following day, on Sunday February 20, in soccer fields all over Italy, soccer players, including the captains of the 3 top teams in the major league, wore jerseys with Giuliana Sgrena's photo and the demand for her liberation, and big banners were hung from the stadiums with the same demand.
Leading the demonstration in Rome was the banner of the Italian communist daily Il Manifesto, for which Giuliana has been reporting for many decades, and in first row stood Giuliana's elderly parents, Franco and Antonietta, her father a partisan during World War II, and both actively involved in organizing the march. Participating in the march were also a great number of journalists and press, many bearing signs saying "Not an embedded journalist", and a contingent from RAI, the State owned Italian television which, prompted by the Berlusconi government, had refused to broadcast the march live.
By contrast, images of the demonstration were broadcast and broad coverage given all over the Arab countries. Giuliana Sgrena, a reporter and photographer for the communist daily Il Manifesto was kidnapped on February 4 in Baghdad just as she had finished interviewing a group of refugees from Falluja. On February 16 a video was delivered to APII by her captors with images of Giuliana calling on people to put pressure on the Italian government for the pull out of the Italian "mission" and to help free her. She issued a strong appeal to all those who have been fighting at her side over decades for justice and against war to mobilize, and for her partner to circulate the pictures she took of Iraqi victims of the war in hospitals and refugee camps.