GOMA - Italian prosecuting authorities investigating the death of Ambassador Luca Attanasio in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have placed an official of the UN's World Food Programme under investigation, according to judicial sources,

  The unnamed official is accused of omitting to put in place the necessary safety precautions for the Ambassador's convoy which was travelling through what is known is known to be a dangerous national park.

  Rome prosecutors had been questioning five WFP employees about the killing of Attanasio, a Carabiniere guard Vittorio Iocavacci and Congolese driver Mustapha Milambo in an ambush that is thought to have be an attempted kidnapping. The interrogations led to one of them, an officer responsible for the security of the expedition, being officially placed under investigation.

  Just a few days after the attack, Italy sent a group of the Carabinieri's Special Operations Group to the Congo to investigate, and in May, several suspects were arrested for involvement in the attack.

  Attanasio is the second European ambassador to have been killed while serving in the DRC.

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