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“With deep sadness, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirms today the death of the Italian ambassador in Goma,” says the report. The ministry added that an Italian policeman is also among the dead.
In a separate statement, Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio expressed “great disappointment and endless sadness” and interrupted a meeting with his EU counterparts in Brussels to return to Rome earlier.
“The circumstances of this brutal attack are not yet known. Every effort will be made to find out what happened,” said Di Maio, paying tribute to the victims of the crime, “two state officials.”
Italian President Sergio Mattarella, for his part, condemned the “cowardly attack” and Prime Minister Mario Draghi expressed “his deepest condolences.”
“The Italian Republic is in mourning for these officials who have lost their lives,” Mattarella said in a statement in which the president expressed “his most sincere condolences and solidarity” to the families of the victims.
Attanasio, 43, has been the Italian ambassador to Kinshasa since 2017. He joined the diplomatic service in 2003 and has previously worked in Switzerland, Morocco and Nigeria.
According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the ambassador and the policeman were traveling in the convoy of cars of the UN peacekeeping mission MONUSCO.
A diplomat in Kinshasa told AFP that Attanasio had been shot dead during an attack on a UN World Food Program (WFP) convoy of cars near Goma.
A representative of the Rome-based WFP did not confirm this information, but simply stated that the organization was following the reports.
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