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New Victims? Two Italian Hostages Feared Dead in Libya

© AP Photo / Mohammad HannonLibyan security forces stands guard in Benghazi, Libya (File)
Libyan security forces stands guard in Benghazi, Libya (File) - Sputnik International
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Two Italian construction workers may have been killed in Libya during a gunfight between Daesh militants and local militias, the Italian Foreign Ministry announced on Thursdasy.

An aerial shot taken from a helicopter shows the Libyan capital Tripoli. (File) - Sputnik International
Tripoli Endorses Possible Italy-Led Anti-Terrorist Operation in Libya - FM
Fausto Piano, 60, and Salvatore Failla, 47, are two of the four Italians working for Italian construction company Bonatti when they were kidnapped last summer near an industrial complex owned by the Italian energy giant Eni in the western Libyan city of Mellitah, the Ministry press service said in a statement.

The bodies of Piano and Failla were identified from photographs posted online after the firefight, which happened on Wednesday near the Libyan city of Sabratha. Their identity has not been definitively confirmed yet, because officials have not had access to the bodies.

According to one eyewitness the terrorists used the hostages as human shields during the gunfight.

Meanwhile, the head of the Sabratha council, Hussein al-Zawadi, said on Friday that the other two Italian hostages had been freed earlier in the day.
Gino Pollicardo and Filippo Calcagno were freed from a house in a northwestern district of Sabratha, which was the scene of fierce fighting between

Daesh terrorists and a local coalition of militia and forces loyal to the government in Tripoli.

According to official reports, Pollicardo and Calcagno had managed to break down the front door and were rescued by local fighters who arrived at the scene after being alerted by neighbors, al-Zawadi said.

Earlier this month the body of an Italian student who went missing in Cairo was found by the roadside with cigarette burns and other signs of torture.

Giulio Regeni disappeared on January 25, the fifth anniversary of the 2011 uprising that toppled the country’s veteran president Hosni Mubarak.

In Rome, the leader of the Lega Nord Party, Matteo Salvini accused President Sergio Mattarella and Prime Minister Matteo Renzi of imitating a real fight against Daesh.

He demanded a parliamentary probe into the situation in Libya insisted on Italy playing a bigger role in ending the long-running conflict there.

Late last month two Serbian diplomats, abducted by Islamist militants in Libya, died in a US airstrike that targeted a terrorist training camp in Sabratha.

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