ITALY: Italy was last night still celebrating the release of the "two Simonas", the two Baghdad-based Italian aid workers taken hostage on September 7th and released on Tuesday.
Both young women were guests of honour at civic receptions in their home towns, with Simona Torretta being feted at Rome's town hall while her friend and colleague Simona Pari was similarly honoured in her native Rimini.
In a symbolic gesture in Rome, Ms Torretta pulled down pictures of both herself and Ms Pari, pictures that had been hung from the town hall building by way of solidarity during their captivity.
Both women expressed gratitude for the efforts made for their release but urged people not to forget the suffering of the Iraqi people: "When they [the captors\] realised exactly what work we were doing, they treated us with respect and with dignity. I would particularly like to thank the Muslim community worldwide, I know that they expressed a lot of solidarity towards us and in particular I would like to thank the Iraqi people.", said Ms Torretta. "I ask you all not to forget Iraq because just now in that country, terrible things are happening", said Ms Pari.
But even as the toasts rang out, many questioned aspects of the kidnapping and subsequent release of the two 29-year-old women. Above all, there were sharply contradictory reports yesterday as to whether or not a ransom had been paid. Both Italian Foreign Minister Mr Franco Frattini and the Italian Red Cross commissioner, Mr Maurizio Scelli, the man to whom the two women were consigned on Tuesday evening, vehemently denied that money had changed hands: "The only weapon we used was our huge network of contacts which made it clear to the kidnappers who they were dealing with, namely with Italy, a country that is liked and admired in the Arab world", said Mr Frattini.
That version of events, however, was contradicted by Mr Gustavo Selva, president of the foreign affairs parliamentary commission, who told French radio station RTL that reports of a ransom being paid were "probably exact". Furthermore, Ali Al Roz, editor of the Kuwait newspaper Al Rai Al-Aam, yesterday repeated his newspaper's claims that a $1 million ransom had been paid by agents acting on behalf of the Italian government. It was Al Rai Al-Aam which last Saturday announced that, notwithstanding web site reports last week of their execution, the two women were in fact alive and well. On Monday, the paper then suggested that the release of the two women was imminent.
According to Al Rai Al-Aam, the two women were taken hostage by an Iraqi resistance movement, unconnected to either al-Qaeda or the group led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. When the movement satisfied itself the two women and the two Iraqis taken captive with them, Mhanaz Bassam and Ra'ad Ali Abdulaziz, were not Italian secret service operatives but aid workers, they entered into negotiations for their release.
At first the group asked not only for Italy's 2,700 strong military force to be withdrawn but also for a $5 million ransom. Over last weekend, according to Al Rai Al-Aam, an agreement was reached, with $500,000 dollars being paid on Monday evening and the other $500,000 on Tuesday morning, just hours before their release.