Kinshasa: Italy’s ambassador to Democratic Republic of Congo was killed on Monday along with his bodyguard and a World Food Programme driver when their convoy was attacked in the east of the country, Italy and the United Nations said.
The assailants stopped the convoy by firing warning shots, killed the Congolese driver and were leading the passengers into the forest when park rangers opened fire, the governor of North Kivu province, Carly Nzanzu Kasivita, told Reuters.
The Italian ambassador, Luca Attanasio, 43, was hit in the abdomen and died several hours later at the U.N. hospital in the regional capital Goma, Congo’s interior ministry said.
Italy said Attanasio’s bodyguard Vittorio Iacovacci, 30, also died in the attack. The driver was named by a security source and local rights activists as Mustapha Milambo.
It was with great shock and immense sorrow that I learned of the death today of our Ambassador to the Democratic Republic of Congo and of a Carabinieri policeman, Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said in a statement.