TURKEY: Mehmet Ali Agca, the Turkish gunman who wounded Pope John Paul gravely in a failed assassination attempt in 1981, is grief-stricken over the Pontiff's death, according to his brother.
Agca, now in an Istanbul prison, was mourning the loss of "a great friend", according to the gunman's brother, Adnan Agca. "He is extremely saddened, he is in grief. He loved the Pope. They developed a personal friendship while Mehmet Ali was [ imprisoned] in Italy, and they had announced their brotherhood.
"The Pope showed my brother and the rest of our family closeness. He was a great man."
Adnan added he and his mother were received by the Pope six times at the Vatican over the years.
The Pope forgave his assailant during a meeting in his Italian prison cell in 1983, two years after Agca shot the Pope in the abdomen during a general audience in St Peter's Square.
Many have hailed the Pope's reconciliation with Agca as an example of the Christian principle of forgiveness.
Agca was extradited to Turkey in 2000 to serve a sentence for other crimes after spending 19 years in an Italian prison for the shooting.
Over the years, Agca has given conflicting reasons for his attempt on the Pontiff's life, including allegations of a conspiracy with Bulgaria's communist-era secret services and the Soviet KGB, who feared the Polish-born Pope would stir anti-communist revolt in Eastern Europe.