Red Cross helped Iraqi insurgents, official says

ITALY’S Red Cross treated four Iraqi insurgents with the knowledge of the Italian Government last year and hid them from US forces in exchange for the freedom of two kidnapped aid workers, a top Italian Red Cross official said in an interview published yesterday.

Maurizio Scelli, the outgoing chief of the Italian Red Cross, told Turin newspaper La Stampa he kept the deal secret from US officials, complying with “a non-negotiable condition” imposed by Iraqi mediators who helped secure the release of Italians Simona Pari and Simona Torretta. They were abducted in Baghdad on September 7 and freed on September 28.

“The mediators asked us to save the lives of four alleged terrorists wanted by the Americans who were wounded in combat,” Mr Scelli was quoted as saying. “We hid them and brought them to Red Cross doctors, who operated on them.”

They took the insurgents to a Baghdad hospital in a jeep and an ambulance, smuggling them through two US checkpoints under blankets and boxes of medicines, Mr Scelli said.

Also as part of the deal, four Iraqi children with leukaemia were brought to Italy for treatment, he said.

Mr Scelli said he informed Premier Silvio Berlusconi’s government of the deal and of the decision to hide it from the US.

“Keeping quiet with the Americans about our efforts to free the hostages was an irrevocable condition to guarantee the safety of the hostages and ourselves,” he said.

Officials at the Italian Red Cross headquarters in Rome said Mr Scelli was out of the office and could not be contacted.

In a statement yesterday, the Italian government said Mr Scelli acted independently and that the government “never conditioned or oriented his action, which was developed in complete autonomy”.