Italians demand release of hostage in Afghanistan

ROME - Hundreds of Italians gathered in the centre of Rome to demand the release of Clementina Cantoni, an aid worker kidnapped a week ago in Afghanistan.

"I don't want Clementina Cantoni to feel alone. I want her to know that the entire country is by her side," Rome Mayor Walter Veltroni told the crowd.

Cantoni, 32, a worker for the CARE International aid agency, was abducted by four gunmen who stopped her vehicle on a Kabul street and bundled her into a car.

A man the Afghan government says abducted Cantoni has spoken to media several times, giving a baffling series of accounts, demands and threats, and even claiming he had killed her.

Afghan authorities, however, say they are in constant contact with the kidnappers and that Cantoni is fine.

The demonstration in Italy failed to mobilise Italians in the way a series of kidnappings in Iraq did.

Tens of thousands of people took to the streets in February to demand the release of Giuliana Sgrena, a popular reporter who writes for Communist daily Il Manifesto.

When aid workers Simona Pari and Simona Torretta were kidnapped last year, pictures of the young women dubbed "the two Simonas" filled newspapers.

All three women were eventually freed. Sgrena and Torretta participated in Monday's demonstration.

- REUTERS