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Uproar in Italy after attack on journalist

Published Mar 9, 2005 3:59 PM

Will the Pentagon get away with murder again? Or will the U.S. gunfire that killed a top Italian intelligence agent and nearly killed journalist Giuliana Sgrena arouse a mass movement in Italy that forces the government to pull its troops out of Iraq?

That would be the most important outcome of these criminal acts by the U.S. military in what has been a criminal war and a criminal occupation. A look at the background will help in following the events as they develop.

Sgrena, a journalist for the progressive Italian daily, Il Manifesto, had been writing articles from Iraq until early February. Her articles reported U.S. occupation atrocities inflicted on the Iraqis. She wrote of the horrible treatment of Iraqi prisoners, what appeared to be the U.S. use of napalm in Falluja, and the deaths of many obvious non-combatants there.

On Feb. 4 she was kidnapped by a resistance group named "Mujahedin without Borders." Sgrena's own report was that her kidnappers believed she was a spy, as she was asking everyone questions. In the course of the month they held her captive, Sgrena appeared on a video pleading for her release and asking the Italian government to withdraw its troops from Iraq.

A movement grew up in Italy to demand her release, along with that of French journalist Florence Aubenas and an Iraqi driver, Hussein Hanoun. The movement that made these demands on the Iraqi resistance forces was also against the war. Millions of Italians identified with Sgrena both on human terms, as happens when someone in danger is reported on daily, and because she was a courageous anti-war journalist.

On Feb. 19, some half-million people demonstrated in Rome demanding the release of Sgrena and the withdrawal of Italian troops from Iraq.

Role of the Italian government

The right-wing government headed by media magnate Silvio Berlusconi has aligned Italy's foreign policy with that of the U.S. and the Bush administration. He has kept 3,000 Italian troops in Iraq--mostly away from the combat zone--despite the overwhelming opposition of the Italian population to the U.S. war there. His government is vulnerable on the war issue as well as economic issues, but so far he has managed to stay in office since he won the 2001 elections.

Had he succeeded in using the Italian state power to bring Sgrena back to Italy unharmed, Berlusconi would have emerged in as good a political position as possible under the circumstances. He would have shown mercy for a political enemy and independence from his U.S. allies regarding Italian affairs. Italy's foreign intelligence service, SISMI, was given the responsibility of arranging the turn over of Sgrena.

SISMI has a history of working hand-in-hand with the CIA against socialist countries or against rebellious countries in the "Third World." In this case, the SISMI agent in charge of the operation, Nicola Calipari, was the one to make arrangements for Sgrena's release with the Iraqi resistance, something Washington looks unkindly upon. Calipari wound up killed by U.S. troops within a mile of the Baghdad airport and the plane back to Rome.

U.S. forces and journalists

In Iraq, the U.S. military has tolerated journalists as long as they were "embedded," that is, as long as what they saw was controlled by the U.S. generals. Others have faced more than the usual dangers.

On April 8, 2003, U.S. tank fire killed Reuters cameraman Taras Protsyuk and a Spanish television network Telecinco cameraman, Jose Couso, in the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad. The same day, Al-Jazeera television reporter Tariq Ayoub was killed on the other side of the Tigris River by a rocket fired from a plane.

Since then at least 63 journalists have died in Iraq. CNN chief news executive Eason Jordan said at the Davos meeting on Jan. 27 in Switzerland that perhaps a dozen weren't just collateral damage but were killed on purpose by U.S. fire. That remark cost him his job.

U.S. military authorities have even blamed media coverage for the Army's failure to recruit new volunteers. According to the New York Times of March 4, "Top Pentagon officials acknowledged that the graphic images of casualties from Iraq and the obvious danger of serving there had caused many parents to advise their children to avoid joining the military now."

In Sgrena's case, the Pentagon considered her a communist reporter, causing trouble for them in Iraq. Sgrena herself has given two reasons why U.S. forces might have deliberately targeted her. First, because she had information for a story that they would not want to see published. Second, to punish the Italian government for negotiating with the Iraqi resistance over possible ransom payments.

Sgrena's captors had warned her that the U.S. forces didn't want her to return safely to Italy: "They declared that they were committed to the fullest to freeing me, but I had to be careful--'the Amer icans don't want you to go back.'"

What happened on the road?

After the shooting on the airport road, the Pentagon claimed that the car had been speeding toward a checkpoint, that U.S. troops had flashed lights warning the car to stop, that the driver ignored their signals and that they only then peppered the car with hundreds of rounds. The story sounded as unlikely as the one told by the New York City undercover cops who killed Amadou Diallo. They claimed he pulled a wallet that looked like a weapon before they fired 41 shots.

"I only remember fire," Sgrena wrote. "At that point, a rain of fire and bullets hit us, shutting up forever the cheerful voices of a few minutes earlier. The driver started yelling that we were Italians. 'We are Italians, we are Italians.' Nicola Calipari threw himself on me to protect me and immediately, I repeat, immediately I heard his last breath as he was dying on me."

No checkpoint, no lights, no warning. Another SISMI agent, who had been driving the car, backed up her story. Even the Italian government agreed and demanded an investigation and an explanation from the U.S. The Italian foreign minister, Gian franco Fini, the head of a neo-fascist party, refuses to allow that the U.S. might have ambushed the Italians, but even he demands something more than the utter contempt Washington has offered its Italian ally.

Sgrena's partner, Pierre Scolari, suggested the incident was intentional. "I hope the Italian government does something because either this was an ambush, as I think, or we are dealing with imbeciles or terrorized kids who shoot at anyone," he said.

It's true that hundreds if not thousands of Iraqis have been killed by troops at roadblocks who were frightened that the next car bomb might get them, and whose orders of engagement allow the murder of civilians. But it's also true that the U.S., which was in control of the airport and the only road to it, knew that Sgrena had been released and that a special plane was waiting to take off for Italy within minutes. More damning information is expected to come out.

Italians are honoring Sgrena on International Women's Day, March 8, and there have been vigils and sit-ins at the U.S. Embassy in Rome and consulates in other cities. A mass demonstration is set for March 19 in Rome against the occupation and war. It is these actions that will determine if Berlusconi follows the Spanish ex-Prime Minister José María Aznar into the dustbin of history for his support of U.S. aggressive wars.

To read Sgrena's articles in English, see www.ilmanifesto.it/pag/sgrena/en/.