The 39th anniversary of the
kidnapping of Christian Democrat (DC) statesman Aldo Moro was
marked today at the Rome site where he was taken hostage and his
police escort slaughtered by the Red Brigades (BR).
Interior Minister Marco Minniti, accompanied by Rome Prefect
Paola Basilone, Italian police chief Franco Gabrielli and the
Carabinieri commander-in-chief, Tullio Del Sette, laid a laurel
wreath and stopped for a moment of silent prayer at via Fani,
the street where Moro's car and escort were ambushed and his
five-man escort - three police and two Carabinieri - was gunned
down.
Later, President Sergio Mattarella laid a wreath of flowers
at the spot.
Moro was kidnapped on March 16, 1978 on the same day that
parliament voted its confidence in Giulio Andreotti's DC
government, the first government which the Italian Communist
Party (PCI) did not vote against and thus indirectly offered
its consent.
Moro's ordeal lasted 55 days during which Andreotti's
policy of offering no concessions to the BR won out over
efforts in his own party and, especially, in the Socialist
Party of Bettino Craxi, to negotiate Moro's release.
Moro's bullet-ridden body was found May 9 in the trunk
of a car strategically parked between the headquarters of the
PCI and the DC.
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