{"id":114727,"date":"2021-02-22T21:42:54","date_gmt":"2021-02-22T13:42:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.namnewsnetwork.org\/?p=114727"},"modified":"2021-02-22T21:42:57","modified_gmt":"2021-02-22T13:42:57","slug":"italian-ambassador-to-dr-congo-dies-in-attack-on-un-convoy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/?p=114727","title":{"rendered":"Italian ambassador to DR Congo dies in attack on UN convoy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Luca<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Luca Attanasio had been Italy\u2019s head of mission in Kinshasa since 2017 and was made ambassador in 2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

KINSHASA, Feb 22 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Italy\u2019s ambassador to the\u00a0Democratic Republic of the Congo<\/a>\u00a0and two other people have been killed in an attack on a United Nations convoy in the restive east of the vast central African country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The convoy from the World Food Programme was attacked at about 10.15am local time (0815 GMT) during an attempted kidnap near the town of Kanyamahoro, about 10 miles north of the regional capital, Goma, a spokesperson for Virunga national park said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Luca Attanasio and a military policeman travelling with him were killed, the Italian foreign ministry said in a statement. A driver also died in the attack, diplomatic sources and local officials said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was not immediately clear who was behind the attack, but the road on which the convoy was travelling is a frequent site of attacks by bandits and armed militia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is with deep sorrow that the foreign ministry confirms the death today in Goma of the Italian ambassador to the Democratic Republic of Congo, Luca Attanasio, and of a policemen from the carabinieri,\u201d the Italian foreign ministry statement said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe ambassador and the soldier were travelling in a car in a convoy of Monusco, the United Nations Organisation stabilisation mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Attanasio died of his wounds in the UN hospital in Goma. He had been Italy\u2019s head of mission in Kinshasa since 2017 and was made ambassador in 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The UN\u2019s peacekeeping and humanitarian assistance mission in the DRC is one of the biggest and most dangerous such operations in the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere were around five people in the vehicle \u2026 The driver appears to have been killed [immediately] after receiving multiple bullet wounds but others were wounded and taken to the Monusco base \u2026 The situation is tense,\u201d Mambo Kawaya, the president of civil society groups in Nyiragongo territory, told Actualit\u00e9.cd<\/a>, a local news site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dozens of armed groups operate in and around Virunga, which lies along DRC\u2019s borders with Rwanda and Uganda. Park rangers have been repeatedly attacked, including six who were killed in an ambush last month<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In May 2018, gunmen attacked a vehicle carrying tourists travelling from Goma to their accommodation in Virunga national park close to where Attanasio\u2019s convoy was ambushed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A 25-year-old ranger was shot dead, a Congolese driver was wounded and two British tourists were held by the militia overnight. — NNN-AGENCIES<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Luca Attanasio had been Italy\u2019s head of mission in Kinshasa since 2017 and was made ambassador in 2019 KINSHASA, Feb 22 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Italy\u2019s ambassador to the\u00a0Democratic Republic of the Congo\u00a0and two other people have been killed in an attack on a United Nations convoy in the restive east of the vast central African country. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":114729,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[213,209],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114727"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=114727"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114727\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/114729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=114727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=114727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=114727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}