Kidnapped Italian Photojournalist Gabriele Torsello Released

 

ROME (November 3, 2006) – Italian photojournalist Gabriel Torsello, kidnapped in Afghanistan on October 12 while traveling between cities, has been released this morning according to the Italian Defense Ministry in Rome.

A spokesperson for the ministry said aid workers in Afghanistan had received a phone call telling them where they could find Torsello, 36, released on a roadside in Southern Afghanistan after being held three weeks. They said the photographer was in "good" condition. The Italian ambassador to Afghanistan, Ettore Francesco Sequi, confirmed Torsello's freedom and well being.

Agence France-Presse says Torsello has made an emotional telephone call to his mother, father, and sister in Alessano, Italy. "He just kept repeating, 'I'm fine. I'm fine. I love you all,'" his sister Valentina said. ANSA reports that church bells rang across Italy's southern Puglia region as word spread of Torsello's release.

Sequi said Torsello will be taken to Kabul and could be there as early as Sunday, and that NATO military forces may fly the photojournalist back to Kabul.

Officials said Torsello's kidnappers called a medical clinic run by the charity group Emergency on Friday to say that Torsello had been released at 1:30 p.m. Afghan time on the road to Kandahar. Torsello had been photographing medical volunteers at the Emergency NGO clinic three weeks ago before he left to travel to a different region of Afghanistan. It was on that trip that his vehicle was stopped by five armed men, who abducted him but left Torsello's translator behind.

Torsello, a Muslim convert, was seized on October 12 and his captors demanded that Italy withdraw its 1,800 troops from Afghanistan and threatened to kill him. Earlier they had demanded that an Afghan convert to Christianity, who has taken refuge in Italy, be returned to Kabul. Under Islamic law, the man could face the death penalty for his religious conversion.

At first Torsello's abductors claimed to be Taliban when they made their initial demands. But an official spokesperson for the Taliban denied any involvement with the kidnapping and said the abductors were criminals who would be hauled into Islamic court if they were caught. Muslims in Italy and the UK rallied to call for Torsello's release during the three weeks he was held prisoner.

Torsello told AFP that he was chained and kept in the dark while he was held, and moved to various locations. "At least I had the Koran that I could read," he told AFP.

Italian Foreign Minister Massimo d'Alema said the Italian military intelligence service played "an essential role" during the time Torsello was held captive and in the process of securing his freedom.

Torsello shoots for ZUMA Press in Dana Point, CA, and lives in London with his Austrian wife and a young son. He's a native of Alessano, Italy.

Read an earlier story here.

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