ROME: Al Qaeda’s North African wing said on Monday it was responsible for the kidnapping this month of an Italian couple in Mauritania, Al Arabiya television reported.
Salah Abu Mohamed, a spokesman for Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, said in an audiotape recorded on Dec. 27 the seizure of the Italians was connected to the “crimes of the Italian government in Afghanistan and Iraq,” Al Arabiya said. The television channel posted on its website a photograph of the couple surrounded by armed men.
Italy said Monday it would not negotiate with Al-Qaeda group. Italy’s Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said Rome had no direct contact with any representative of the group.
“If we decided to negotiate, even just once, we would have legitimized a terrorist organization. Anyone who negotiates with terrorists supports terrorists,” he said in an interview on the Sky
The government said the report would not affect efforts to secure the release of the couple, whose bullet-ridden car was discovered on Dec. 19 in eastern Mauritanian, an area where armed groups with links to Al-Qaeda are known to operate.
“I don’t think this changes anything with respect to the efforts which are underway,” Alfredo Mantica, undersecretary for foreign affairs, told Sky Italia television.
Mantica said kidnappings in the area were usually a question of ransom, rather than ideology.
Italy has said it is using all channels to secure the release of the couple, identified as Sergio Cicala, 65, and his 39-year-old wife Philomene Kabouree, who is from Burkina Faso and has dual Italian nationality.
In early December, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb also said it was responsible for the kidnapping in late November of three Spanish aid workers in Mauritania and one Frenchman in Mali.
