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ROME, Oct. 1 -- For three weeks, Italians across the country marched, held vigils and lit candles, and politicians united to promote freedom for a pair of humanitarian aid workers held captive in Iraq. Only days after the safe return of Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, the country and its politicians are divided. The celebration of the "Two Simonas," as the pair came to be known, has been clouded by a wave of recrimination over Italy's participation in the U.S.-led efforts to pacify Iraq. Detractors called the women ingrates and accused them of being soft on terrorists. Opposition politicians renewed...

Italians fall out of love with 'two Simonas' By Bruce Johnston in Rome (Filed: 02/10/2004) Italy's adoration of the "two Simonas", the women aid workers abducted in Iraq, began to sour yesterday, as the extent of their sympathy for the Iraqi fight against the allied occupation became clear. Simona Pari, Simona Torretta and Lello Rienzi talk to the press In their first big interviews given since their release in return for a reported $1 million ransom on Tuesday, Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, both 29, gave their backing to insurgents opposing the allied forces. Miss Pari, when asked why she...

Italy's adoration of the "two Simonas", the women aid workers abducted in Iraq, began to sour yesterday, as the extent of their sympathy for the Iraqi fight against the allied occupation became clear. In their first big interviews given since their release in return for a reported $1 million ransom on Tuesday, Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, both 29, gave their backing to insurgents opposing the allied forces. Miss Pari, when asked why she and her colleague had not asked on their return for the release of other hostages, said: "We didn't know there were any other hostages. No one...

Freed Italian Hostage Says Iraq Rebels 'Justified' ROME (Oct. 1) - An Italian aid worker held hostage last month in Iraq said guerrillas there were right to fight U.S.-led forces and their Iraqi "puppet government." In comments that were bound to annoy Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's government, Simona Torretta also called on Rome to withdraw the troops it sent to Iraq to support its U.S. ally. Former Captive Backs Guerillas "I said it before the kidnapping and I repeat it today," she told Corriere della Sera newspaper in an interview published Friday. "You have to distinguish between terrorism and resistance....

ROME (Reuters) - An Italian aid worker held hostage last month in Iraq said guerrillas there were right to fight U.S.-led forces and their Iraqi "puppet government." In comments that were bound to annoy Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's government, Simona Torretta also called on Rome to withdraw the troops it sent to Iraq to support its U.S. ally. "I said it before the kidnapping and I repeat it today," she told Corriere della Sera newspaper in an interview published Friday. "You have to distinguish between terrorism and resistance. The guerrilla war is justified, but I am against the kidnapping of...

KUWAIT - The Kuwaiti newspaper that predicted the release of two Italian hostages in Iraq says the captors had originally demanded a US$5 million ($7.56 million) ransom but settled for US$1 million in the end. "A cleric mediated to get the amount of the ransom lowered," said Ali el-Roz, managing editor of leading daily al-Rai al-Aam. "When they asked for the US$5 million, the cleric who is mediating told the captors that they can't set conditions but rather that they have to accept conditions imposed on them." Roz also said in an interview that the clerics mediating for the Italians'...

ROME – Euphoria still lingers in the air after the triumphant homecoming of two Italian aid workers held hostage in Iraq. But concern intensified Wednesday that by saving the "two Simonas," Italy may have inspired a whole new phase of kidnapping in Iraq, sending a message to criminal gangs that western hostages are worth millions of dollars. Amid reports that at least $1 million was paid for the release of Simona Pari and Simona Parretta after 21 days of agonizing negotiations with their captors, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said only that the government made "a very difficult choice." But Gustavo...

ROME, Sept 29 (AFP):One of two Italian women released after three weeks captivity in Iraq said she was ready to go back to the war-wracked country to continue her aid work, and told of being given sweets by her kidnappers as a farewell gift. "I would do it all over again with all the consequences that that carries even though I'm sorry for all the suffering my mother went through and didn't deserve," Simona Torretta told reporters late Tuesday after she and Simona Pari, both 29, were released by their Iraqi kidnappers and flown back to Rome. Both women worked...

Ransom payments seen fuelling Iraq's hostage crisis By Luke Baker BAGHDAD, Sept 29 (Reuters) - The release of two Italian aid workers in Iraq has raised hopes other hostages may soon be freed, but reports that a large ransom was paid may only feed the burgeoning hostage crisis. The two Italians, Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, had been seized along with two Iraqi colleagues from a central Baghdad office in a brazen attack witnesses described as very organised and probably carried out by a criminal gang. Gustavo Selva, an Italian lawmaker, told French radio a ransom of around $1 million...

Scelli denies the payment of redeems: "Speeches that offend to me" "Dealt well, have asked us forgiveness" The interrogation to the Power of attorney until the 3 of night. Then the return to house for the two Simone. The first particular of the seizure ROME - they have been the entire time or nearly bound and therefore they have not never seen in face their kidnappers than between the other they spoke in English. They have changed many prisons but they are remained to Bagdad . They have been always with during the 21 held days of the seizure...

ROME, Sept. 28 — Italy rejoiced tonight at the safe release of the young Italian aid workers known here as "the two Simonas," whose three weeks in captivity wrenched the nation and stamped real faces on the rising dangers of the war in Iraq. "I felt chills when I heard the news," Manuela Mancucci, 24, a street vendor in downtown Rome, said early in the evening as the news spread that Simona Pari and Simona Torretta had been released in Baghdad. "I'm so happy for them and their families." The kidnapping of the two women, in a raid on their...

Two Italian Aid Workers who have been held captive in Iraq freed. No story yet.

The director of To RAI: "Free within friday" The president of the Union of the Communities and Organizations Muslims in Italy is to Bagdad in order to contact the kidnappers ROME - the two Italian humanitarian operatrici Simona Equal Torretta and Simona will be rilasciate within "within friday, less than something it does not go badly in negotiates to you in course ". It has said a source to the correspondent to Bagdad of the daily paper of the Kuwait To RAI to the Aam, that the news will publish tuesday. It negotiates to you - it has said...

"Taken two abductors of the Italians" The tv To the Arabya: USA forces have captured two jailers after one shoot-out. The government: "Hush he is of obligation" BAGDAD - the flash of the agency Italian hour arrives to the 20,24. The news, brought back from the tv of the Dubai To the Arabya, it is all to confirm but it opens insperati scenes on the vicissitude of the two kidnapped Italians in Iraq the 7 past september. According to To the Arabya in fact they would have been taken two presumed abductor ones been involved in the rapimento of...

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...

ITALY endured a day of anguish and confusion over the fate of two Italian women hostages after an Islamic website claimed early yesterday morning that they had been beheaded “without mercy”.Simona Torretta and Simona Pari, both aged 29 and members of the Italian aid agency Bridge to Baghdad, had been seized on September 7 from their Baghdad offices, with two Iraqi assistants. The women have not been heard of since, and the hostage-takers have released no video footage of them. Messages on the internet over the past two weeks have given warning that they would be killed unless the 3,000...

DUBAI: A second group yesterday claimed to have beheaded two women Italian aid workers held hostage in Iraq, in a statement on the Internet, following a similar unconfirmed claim from another group.The authenticity of the claims could not be verified."The heads of the two Italian criminals, Italian intelligence agents Simona Terretta and Simona Pari, were mercilessly cut off with a knife," said the latest statement attributed to a group calling itself Ansar Al Zawahiri.The group, whose name was taken from Ayman Al Zawahiri, the Egyptian number two in the Al Qaeda terror network, said a video would be released...

Concern was mounting last night over the fate of two Italian aid workers kidnapped in Baghdad a fortnight ago, after two separate statements appeared on the internet claiming that the women had been killed. Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, both 29, were seized with two of their Iraqi colleagues in daylight from their office in central Baghdad on September 7. They had been working in Iraq for several months for the aid agency Bridge to Baghdad. Statements from two separate groups appeared on different websites yesterday, each claiming the murders. Some statements, supposedly from militant groups in Iraq, have proven...

DUBAI (Reuters) - An Islamist group in Iraq (news - web sites) has said it killed two female Italian hostages in a statement posted on an Internet site not often used by Iraqi militants. The group, calling itself the Jihad Organization, said it had killed the women after Italy did not heed its call to withdraw its forces from Iraq. A group with a similar name, the Islamic Jihad Organization, said on September 12 that it would kill the hostages in 24 hours if Italian troops did not leave Iraq.

Iraq's Deputy Foreign Minister said that the kidnappers of the two Italian female aid workers may have sold the women to Abu Mus'ab Al Zarqawi and that they have been transferred from Baghdad to Fallujah.Al Zaman Newspaper of Iraq 9/20/04