Italian ambassador to Congo killed in convoy attack
An attack on a United Nations convoy has killed the Italian ambassador to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Italy’s foreign ministry said Monday.
The ambush on the World Food Program convoy that killed Ambassador Luca Attanasio and the officer occurred near Goma; Congo’s eastern regional capital in the territory of Nyiragongo; in North Kivu; Congolese civilians said.
“The rebels stopped the WFP convoy with bullets, before bringing down the passengers on board including the ambassador,” Provincial Governor Carly Nzanzu told Al Jazeera. “They took all the passengers and the ambassador to the bush. And a few minutes later on their way, they killed the Congolese driver and then the ambassador’s bodyguard.”
The WFP said; a delegation was on a field trip to visit one of their school feeding programs in Rutshuru; when they came under attack.
“It is with deep sorrow that the Farnesina confirms the death, today in Goma, of the Ambassador of Italy to the Democratic Republic of Congo Luca Attanasio and of a soldier from the Carabinieri,” the ministry said in a statement.
Italy’s Prime Minister, Mario Draghi has put out a statement expressing his condolences to the families of the Italian ambassador and the soldier, named Vittorio Iacovacci.
The World Food Programme (WFP) said in a statement; that one of its drivers was killed in the attack.
Others in the convoy also sustained injuries, according to the UN agency.
The eastern region of the African nation, the site of a 17-year conflict, has stretched a large UN contingent thin. Before that, a civil war from 1994 to 2003 killed about 5 million people. The UN has about 17,000 peacekeeping personnel on the ground in the country.
Attanasio had been a diplomat since 2003 and served as ambassador to the Democratic Republic since 2017.
