The ANNOTICO Report

I have already given you the assertions and contradictions relating to the
attack.
One additional fact.  There were 400-500 shots fired in the attack...at a
car....
That much of a barrage?? With 3 wounded and one dead. Bad Intentions and
Bad Aim ??

Regarding Motive: Besides the fact that Sgrena had been a thorn in the side
of the US with her articles pleading the Iraqi case, and highlighting the
hypocrisy of the US, an additional motive surfaces.

It appears that the Italian Government paid a ransom for Sgrena, that the
US government is vehemently and unalterably opposed to paying ransoms. The
US government could discourage such payments by the "accidental" shooting
of the freed hostage. who would have thought that
500 shots wouldn't get the "job" done??

Then again, the US wouldn't have needed to kill Sgrena or Capalari, or
anyone, and a "message" would have been sent, but a few minor agents
wounded without making any martyrs, might be the "optimal" plan, but a "ham
handed" attack can not expect to have "surgical" accuracy.

By Giuliana Sgrena
CNN.com
Sunday, March 6, 2005

[Editor's Note: The following is a translation of a March 6, 2005, article
by journalist Giuliana Sgrena, reprinted here with permission from the
Italian newspaper Il Manifesto. Sgrena was shot and wounded by U.S. forces
in Iraq shortly after being freed from captors. A security agent protecting
her was killed.]

I'm still in the dark. Friday was the most dramatic day of my life. I had
been in captivity for many days. I had just spoken with my captors. It had
been days they were telling me I would be released. I was living in waiting
for this moment. They were speaking about things that only later I would
have understood the importance of. They were speaking about problems
"related to transfers."

I learned to understand what was going on by the behavior of my two guards,
the two guards that had me under custody every day. One in particular
showed much attention to my desires. He was incredibly cheerful. To
understand exactly what was going on I provocatively asked him if he was
happy because I was going or because I was staying. I was shocked and happy
when for the first time he said, "I only know that you will go, but I don't
know when." To confirm the fact that something new was happening both of
them came into my room and started comforting me and kidding:
"Congratulations they said you are leaving for Rome." For Rome, that's
exactly what they said.

I experienced a strange sensation because that word evoked in me freedom
but also projected in me an immense sense of emptiness. I understood that
it was the most difficult moment of my kidnapping and that if everything I
had just experienced until then was "certain," now a huge vacuum of
uncertainty was opening, one heavier than the other. I changed my clothes.
They came back: "We'll take you and don't give any signals of your presence
with us otherwise the Americans could intervene." It was confirmation that
I didn't want to hear; it was altogether the most happy and most dangerous
moment. If we bumped into someone, meaning American military, there would
have been an exchange of fire. My captors were ready and would have
answered.

My eyes had to be covered. I was already getting used to momentary
blindness. What was happening outside? I only knew that it had rained in
Baghdad. The car was proceeding securely in a mud zone. There was a driver
plus the two captors. I immediately heard something I didn't want to hear.
A helicopter was hovering at low altitude right in the area that we had
stopped. "Be calm, they will come and look for you...in 10 minutes they
will come looking for." They spoke in Arabic the whole time, a little bit
of French, and a lot in bad English. Even this time they were speaking that
way.

Then they got out of the car. I remained in the condition of immobility and
blindness. My eyes were padded with cotton, and I had sunglasses on. I was
sitting still. I thought what should I do. I start counting the seconds
that go by between now and the next condition, that of liberty? I had just
started mentally counting when a friendly voice came to my ears "Giuliana,
Giuliana. I am Nicola, don't worry I spoke to Gabriele Polo (editor in
chief of Il Manifesto). Stay calm. You are free." They made me take my
cotton bandage off, and the dark glasses. I felt relieved, not for what was
happening and I couldn't understand but for the words of this "Nicola." He
kept on talking and talking, you couldn't contain him, an avalanche of
friendly phrases and jokes. I finally felt an almost physical consolation,
warmth that I had forgotten for some time.

The car kept on the road, going under an underpass full of puddles and
almost losing control to avoid them. We all incredibly laughed. It was
liberating. Losing control of the car in a street full of water in Baghdad
and maybe wind up in a bad car accident after all I had been through would
really be a tale I would not be able to tell. Nicola Calipari sat next to
me. The driver twice called the embassy and in Italy that we were heading
towards the airport that I knew was heavily patrolled by U.S. troops. They
told me that we were less than a kilometer away...when...I only remember
fire. At that point, a rain of fire and bullets hit us, shutting up forever
the cheerful voices of a few minutes earlier.

The driver started yelling that we were Italians. "We are Italians, we are
Italians." Nicola Calipari threw himself on me to protect me and
immediately, I repeat, immediately I heard his last breath as he was dying
on me. I must have felt physical pain. I didn't know why. But then I
realized my mind went immediately to the things the captors had told me.
They declared that they were committed to the fullest to freeing me but I
had to be careful, "the Americans don't want you to go back." Then when
they had told me I considered those words superfluous and ideological. At
that moment they risked acquiring the flavor of the bitterest of truths, at
this time I cannot tell you the rest.

This was the most dramatic day. But the months that I spent in captivity
probably changed forever my existence. One month alone with myself,
prisoner of my profound certainties. Every hour was an impious verification
of my work, sometimes they made fun of me, and they even stretch as far as
asking why I wanted to leave, asking me stay. They insisted on personal
relationships. It was them that made me think of the priorities that too
often we cast aside. They were pointing to family. "Ask your husband for
help," they would say. And I also said in the first video that I think you
all saw, "My life has changed." As Iraqi engineer Ra'ad Ali Abdulaziz of
the organization A Bridge For [Baghdad], who had been kidnapped with the
two Simones had told me "my life is not the same anymore." I didn't
understand. Now I know what he meant. Because I experienced the harshness
of truth, it's difficult proposition (of truth) and the fragility of those
who attempt it.

In the first days of my kidnapping I did not shed a tear. I was simply
furious. I would say in the face of my captors: "But why do you kidnap me,
I'm against the war." And at that point they would start a ferocious
dialogue. "Yes because you go speak to the people, we would never kidnap a
journalist that remains closed in a hotel and because the fact that you say
you're against the war could be a decoy." And I would answer almost to
provoke them: "It's easy to kidnap a weak woman like me, why don't you try
with the American military." I insisted on the fact that they could not ask
the Italian government to withdraw the troops. Their political go-between
could not be the government but the Italian people, who were and are
against the war.

It was a month on a see-saw shifting between strong hope and moments of
great depression. Like when it was a first Sunday after the Friday they
kidnapped me, in the house in Baghdad where I was kept, and on top of which
was a satellite dish they showed me the Euronews Newscast. There I saw a
huge picture of me hanging from Rome City Hall. I felt relieved. Right
after though the claim by the Jihad that announced my execution if Italy
did not withdraw the troops arrived. I was terrified. But I immediately
felt reassured that it wasn't them. I didn't have to believe these
announcements, they were "provocative."

Often I asked the captor that from his face I could identify a good
disposition but whom like his colleagues resembled a soldier: "Tell me the
truth. Do you want to kill me?" Although many times there have been windows
of communications with them. "Come watch a movie on TV" they would say
while a Wahabi roamed around the house and took care of me. The captors
seemed to me a very religious group, in continuous prayer on the Koran. But
Friday, at the time of the release, the one that looked the most religious
and who woke up every morning at 5 a.m. to pray incredibly congratulated me
shaking my hand, a behavior unusual for an Islamic fundamentalist -- and he
would add "if you behave yourself you will leave immediately."

Then an almost funny incident. One of the two captors came to me surprised
both because the TV was showing big posters of me in European cities and
also for Totti. Yes Totti. He declared he was a fan of the Roma soccer team
and he was shocked that his favorite player went to play with the writing
"Liberate Giuliana" on his T-shirt.

I lived in an enclave in which I had no more certainties. I found myself
profoundly weak. I failed in my certainties; I said that we had to tell
about that dirty war. And I found myself in the alternative either to stay
in the hotel and wait or to end up kidnapped because of my work. We don't
want anyone else anymore. The kidnappers would tell me. But I wanted to
tell about the bloodbath in Fallujah from the words of the refugees. And
that morning the refugees, or some of their leaders would not listen to me.

I had in front of me the accurate confirmation of the analysis of what the
Iraqi society had become as a result of the war and they would throw their
truth in my face: "We don't want anybody why didn't you stay in your home.
What can this interview do for us?" The worse collateral effect, the war
that kills communication was falling on me. To me, I who had risked
everything, challenging the Italian government who didn't want journalists
to reach Iraq and the Americans who don't want our work to be witnessed of
what really became of that country with the war and notwithstanding that
which they call elections. Now I ask myself. Is their refusal a failure?

Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/03/06/il.manifesto