KINSHASA, Congo (AP) – Italian ambassador to Congo, a police officer from the Italian carabinieri and his Congolese driver were killed on Monday when gunmen attacked a United Nations convoy traveling to a school east of the Congo. Congo, as reported by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and residents.
Luca Attanasio, who had worked at the Italian embassy in the country since 2017, was killed by carabinieri officer Vittorio Iacovacci and his driver Moustapha Milambo. Other members of the convoy were injured and taken to a hospital, according to the World Food Program.
The Congolese interior ministry said four other people in the convoy were abducted, but since then the Congolese army has found one person.
The ambush occurred as the convoy was traveling from Goma, the eastern regional capital of Congo, to visit a WFP school project in Rutshuru, the UN agency said.
WFP said the attack took place on a road that had been previously cleared to travel without security escorts and was looking for more information from local officials about the attack. In eastern Congo live countless rebel groups competing for control of the mineral-rich Central African nation the size of Western Europe.
The attack, about 25 kilometers north of Goma, was right next to Virunga National Park. North Kivu Governor Carly Nzanzu Kasivita said the attackers hijacked UN vehicles and took them from the trees. The Congolese army and park rangers from Virunga National Park came to help the attackers, he said.
“There was an exchange of fires. The attackers fired at the bodyguard and the ambassador, “the governor said.
According to a statement from the Congolese Interior Ministry, Attanasio was shot in the abdomen. He was then transferred to the UN mission at the Congo hospital, where he died from his injuries, the ministry said.
Without citing sources, Italian state television said Monday night that the convoy was apparently the target of a kidnapping with the aim of securing ransom money.
Attanasio, a 43-year-old career diplomat, left behind a woman and three young children.
The attack took place in the same area where two Britons were abducted by unidentified gunmen in 2018, said Mambo Kaway, head of a local civil society group.
“The situation is very tense,” he added.
There were no immediate claims of responsibility for the attack.
The Congolese Interior Ministry has blamed the attack on the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, the Rwandan Hutu rebel group known as the FDLR.
The interior ministry said North Kivu provincial authorities were unaware of the Italian ambassador’s presence, which did not allow them to provide him with security measures.
Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi has offered his sincere condolences to the families of the victims and has called for an investigation so that the perpetrators can be brought to justice, according to the president’s office.
More than 2,000 civilians were killed last year in eastern Congo by violence by armed groups whose brutal attacks have displaced more than 5.2 million people in what the UN calls one of the worst crises. humanitarian aid in the world.
Congolese Foreign Minister Marie Tumba Nzenza sent her condolences and promised the Italian government that the Congolese government would do everything it could to find those behind the killings.
Italian President Sergio Mattarella and Prime Minister Mario Draghi also expressed their condolences to the families of the victims. The flags of the Italian government buildings were ordered to fly at half-staff on Monday and Tuesday.
“The circumstances of this brutal attack are still unclear and no efforts will be made to shed light on what happened,” Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said.
Di Maio hastily returned from a European Union ministerial meeting in Brussels in Rome to discuss the attack with Draghi.
Rome prosecutors are investigating crimes abroad against Italians. A specialized carabiner unit was expected to arrive in Kinshasha on Tuesday to help with the Italian investigation.
After diplomatic posts in Switzerland, Morocco and Nigeria, Attanasio was assigned to the embassy in Kinshasa in September 2017.
Last October he was awarded the Nassiriya International Peace Prize at a ceremony held in a church in southern Italy. Attanasio was cited for “having contributed to the realization of important humanitarian projects, distinguished by altruism, dedication and the spirit of service to people in need,” the newspaper La Repubblica reported.
He quoted Attanasio as saying that “everything we take for granted in Italy is not in the Congo, where, unfortunately, there are so many problems to solve.”
Attanasio described the ambassador’s role as “above all being close to the Italians, but also helping to achieve peace.” About 1,000 Italians live in the Congo.
Congo suffered one of the most brutal colonial reigns in the world before decades of corrupt dictatorship passed. Subsequently, civil wars broke out in several neighboring countries. In January 2019, the Congo experienced its first peaceful democratic transfer of power since independence in 1960 after the election of President Felix Tshisekedi.
The UN peacekeeping mission has been working to reduce its presence of more than 17,000 troops in the country and transfer its security task to the Congolese authorities.
“These tragic killings highlight insecurity in eastern Congo,” in an area that has seen rising kidnappings, organized crime and militias, said Ben Shepherd, a consultant for the Chatham House Africa program.
It took place on one of Goma’s main roads, a busy road that is generally considered safe, he said, adding that it would be difficult to know at this time whether it was a random and opportunistic attack on a convoy or a planned attack.
UN peacekeeping chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix said Monday at a planned press conference that UN security officials in the country often determine road safety. He said he had no details on “the exact development of the incident.”
“The research will hopefully bring clarity,” Lacroix added.
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Nicole Winfield reported from Rome. Carley Petesch in Dakar, Senegal, Lorne Cook in Brussels, Frances D’Emilio in Rome, Edith M. Lederer in New York and Andrew Meldrum in Johannesburg, contributed to this report.