A sit-in was staged at the Vatican
Sunday for Emanuela Orlandi, a 15-year-old Vatican citizen who
went missing 40 years ago, and the Holy See allowed
demonstrators to put up banners marking the 40th anniversary of
her disappearance on June 22, 1983.
Orlandi's brother Pietro told reporters: "I would be sorry of
the pope didn't mention her name today" in his Sunday Angelus
blessing.
The Vatican said on the anniversary Thursday that a new
investigation it has opened into Orlandi's case had uncovered
some promising leads, adding that it was sharing the evidence
with Rome prosecutors who are also investigating one of Italy's
and the Vatican's most enduring mysteries.
Orlandi, a resident of the Vatican City, disappeared while
returning home from a flute lesson in Rome on 22 June 1983.
The case sparked an intense media frenzy in Italy that has
resulted in it being called "Italy's most famous unsolved
mystery", and it inspired a hit Netflix four-part documentary
called Vatican Girl: The Disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi last
year.
Last month Rome prosecutors said that they had opened a new
probe into the case.
"In recent months this office gathered all the evidence that
could be found in relation to the Emanuela Orlandi case in the
Vatican and Holy See structures, seeking testimony via
conversions with people in charge of some offices at the time,"
said the Vatican's Office of the Promoter of Justice on the
anniversary.
"It proceeded to examine the material, confirming that some
investigation leads are worthy of further investigation and
transmitting all the relative documentation, in recent weeks, to
the Rome prosecutor's office so that it can see it and proceed
in the direction it considers appropriate".
Emanuela was the fourth of five children of Ercole and Maria
Orlandi.
Her father was a Vatican employee and the family lived inside
Vatican City.
"40 years is a long time. The activity carried out by the
Vatican is a first step," said Pietro Orlandi.
"I hope that the documentation passed to the Rome prosecutor's
office is significant and that the Vatican continues to
cooperate actively with the prosecutor's office.
"Lots of things need to be clarified. My sister deserves truth
and justice".
Pietro Orlandi recently caused controversy by linking the case
to rumours that late Saint Pope John Paul II used to leave the
Vatican looking for girls with Polish cardinals, a claim
rubbished by Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin
and Pope Francis.
Francis called the suggestions about the late Polish pope, who
died in 2005 and became a saint in 2014, unfounded and
offensive.
The Orlandi family said via lawyer Laura Sgro' that they hope
Pope Francis remembers Emanuela "with words of hope" during his
Angelus address on Sunday.
The family also called on Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni to
intervene.
"The Orlandi family believes the ideals of truth and justice do
not have a political colour and do not belong to any party but
to all men of good will," Sgro' told ANSA.
"For this reason it appeals to Premier Giorgia Meloni, with the
hope that she can contribute to the search for the truth about
the disappearance of Emanuela and, at the same time, shed light
on all the events that have scarred Italy over the last 40 years
and remain in the dark".
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © Copyright ANSA
