One of the leaflets with which the
Red Brigades leftist militants claimed responsibility for the
March 1978 kidnapping of Christian Democrat leader Aldo Moro was
sold at auction for just over 32,000 euros Thursday evening.
Former premier Moro was kidnapped in an ambush on 16 March 1978
in which his five police escort were gunned down, and
assassinated by the terrorists 55 days later, on May 9 1978.
The dramatic communique had a starting price of 600 euros on the
website of the Bertolani Fine Art auction house, and rose to
32,760 euros over the three-week auction.
The sale sparked protests in Italy including from journalist
Mario Calabresi, whose father was shot dead in the Years of Lead
of rightwing and leftwing terror.
"Those pages, dripping with blood should, rather, be placed in a
House of Memory", he said.
Centre-left Democratic Party (PD) MP Filippo Sensi
called for "a show of pity that will prevent the sale".
Culture Minister Dario Franceschini said his ministry had opened
a probe into the leaflet in order to assess its "peculiarity and
interest".
There another four extant exemplars of the leaflet but some have
been poorly preserved or are incomplete, the ministry said.
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