Italy Loses Their Mind

Italy Swapped 5 Jailed Taliban for a Hostage

By IAN FISHER

ROME, March 21 —An Italian journalist who was held hostage for 15 days by the Taliban in lawless southern Afghanistan was ransomed for five Taliban prisoners, the Italian government and Afghan officials confirmed Wednesday.

It appears to be the first time prisoners have been openly exchanged for a hostage in the wars that the United States and its allies are fighting there and in Iraq, and the move drew immediate criticism from Washington and London, and from other European capitals.

“We don’t negotiate with terrorists, and we don’t advise others to do so either,” said the State Department spokesman, Sean McCormack.

A senior Bush administration official said the prisoners exchanged had been held by the Afghan government, not by NATO, which is directing the allied military in Afghanistan. The official said he did not believe that NATO officials in Afghanistan had been formally alerted before the exchange.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met with the Italian foreign minister, Massimo D’Alema, in Washington on Monday, the day the hostage, Daniele Mastrogiacomo, 52, of the leftist newspaper La Repubblica, was released. It was not clear whether they discussed an exchange.

Though it may have saved a life, the ransom has set off a worried debate in Italy and in other countries with soldiers, reporters and aid workers in danger zones.

The exchange sent “the wrong signal to prospective hostage takers,” a spokeswoman for the British Foreign Office told Reuters.

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This has got to be one of the stupidest things that Italy has ever done. Right up there with electing Musolini.

What a bunch of dumb shits.