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 MANILA, Philippines -- Italian missionaries, including kidnap victim Father Giancarlo Bossi, will continue their missionary work in Mindanao despite the war in Sulu between government troops and the Abu Sayyaf, according to Italian Ambassador to the Philippines Rubens Anna Fedele.
In a telephone interview, Fedele denied reports that Italian priests would be among the foreign missionaries to be assigned to safer areas. Fedele said that the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions or Pime, which began 150 years ago in Italy, still has four missionaries assigned to Mindanao, including Bossi, who is vacationing in Italy following his release last month. Asked about reports that the Italians along with other missionaries were being pulled out of Mindanao, Fedele replied, "That is not true. I spoke with the people in Pime and they said there is no danger. The war is going on in Jolo and Basilan while all the Italian missionaries are in Zamboanga Sibugay."
Bossi, 57, a member of Pime, was seized last June 10 by 10 armed men near the coastal village of Bulawan in Payao, Zamboanga Sibugay. He was released 40 days later after his captors failed to get their ransom demand. On Saturday, Bossi quietly went home to Italy to testify in a magistrate’s investigation and to take a rest for three months. The priest was to meet Pope Benedict XVI on September 1 in Loreto, central Italy. Fedele said that Bossi would come back to resume his missionary work in the same town where he was kidnapped. Earlier reports quoted Bishop Angelito Lampon, Apostolic Vicar of Jolo, as saying that the Catholic Church has decided not to send foreign priests to high-risk posts after learning of the ordeal of Bossi. Lampon said that the new strategy was to field all-Filipino clergy in Sulu and assign foreign missionaries to safer places such as retreat houses. Shortly after his release, Bossi expressed willingness to go back to his parish in Payao, despite his ordeal. Bossi is the third Italian priest to have been kidnapped in Mindanao in the past 10 years. In 1998, Muslim rebels snatched Father Luciano Benedetti in Zamboanga del Norte and held him captive for 10 weeks before freeing him. Three years later, the Pentagon gang abducted Fr. Giuseppi Pierantoni of Bologna while he was saying Mass in a parish church in Dimataling, Zamboanga del Sur. Pierantoni escaped after six months in captivity. Also in 1998, Fr. Clarence Bertelsman, an American, was also kidnapped in Jolo. He suffered a fatal heart ailment a year after the incident. Another missionary who was kidnapped was Frenchman Father Yves Caroff in Timanan, South Upi in Maguindanao.
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