So where's the report about the Calipari shooting?
A little over a month ago, an Italian secret service agent named Nicola Calipari was killed and two others wounded - Il Manifesto journalist Giuliana Sgrena and a second service agent - when the rented car in which they were driving to Baghdad airport was fired upon by U.S. troops. This incident undoubtedly merited the great attention instantly bestowed upon it by the world press, particularly as it was obvious to most people that it is most unlikely that the shooting could have been an accident, as the Americans predictably proclaimed. Irate Italians were were reassured that the matter would be promptly investigated by a joint Italian-American team and a report issue within 3-4 weeks. But the time is now up, and in the last week I have not seen a single reference to the investigation anywhere, let alone references to the release of the report which we were led to expect to see within a month.
With the conveniently-timed death of Pope John Paul II, a great many Italians have no doubt forgotten about the shooting. Although I eagerly await the American report - I am particularly keen to see how the Americans explain away the fact that there are virtually no points of overlap between their version of the shooting (the one that has come out in dribs and drabs in major organs of the American propaganda system like Newsweek and the New York Times) and Giuliana Sgrena's recollections (whose veracity has been confirmed by the secret service agent who survived the attack) - I am starting to think that a report never will be issued. Certainly, it has not appeared within the time frame initially announced. A particular problem is that the Americans are apparently refusing to allow the Italians involved in the investigation to see the car in which Calipari, Sgrena and their unnamed secret service companion were travelling. The very fact that the Italians are not being allowed to see the chief piece of evidence in the case proves that a typical American cover up is in the making. If the Italians were pushing hard for a report, the Americans would be forced to cough up something, no matter how laughable. But there is no evidence that the Italians care anymore. It may well be that Berlusconi and the Americans have reached an agreement to bury the investigation.
At this stage, I seem to be the only person to be struck by the failure of the promised report to appear on schedule. That doesn't mean we will never see a report - but here one has to ask why more time is needed? After all, if the shooting had really been an accident, the circumstances which had given rise to it could have been clarified almost immediately. We would be talking about a sequence of events which had given rise to a misapprehension on the part of those who actually fired the shots. Instead, it seems, we are either being asked to forget about the shooting until a plausible cover story has been concocted. Given the almost insuperable difficulties under which the Americans are labouring - notably, the survival of two articulate witnesses - the cover story could well be a long time coming.
NB: Worth reading on the Calipari shooting, Joe Vialls, "Bush Ordered Attack on Sgrena and Calipari." However, Vialls seems not to be aware that the Italians were not travelling on the regular road to the airport, but another, which is believed to have been much safer. See Amy Goodman's interview with Naomi Klein.
