Kabul (AsiaNews) – "The international community is close to the Cantoni family and is praying for Clementina's freedom." Thus Mgr Moretti reached out through AsiaNews to the family of the young Italian collaborator kidnapped yesterday in the Afghan capital. Even the local press and people reacted with dismay to an action considered as an offence against the population. Mgr Moretti, who also heads the missio sui iuris in Afghanistan, said the local press today used "regretful tones" to break the news.

"What emerges from newspapers and from conversations with my Afghan collaborators," he said, "is that all view this criminal action as an offence against the population itself, which has always held and continues to hold foreigners in high respect." 

The parish priest of the only Catholic church in the country – the internal chapel of the Italian embassy – said Clementina was among the "very rare practicing Italian Catholics" in the country. "These last Sundays, I saw her come to Mass often and with great conviction: here, those who come to Mass come because they want to, it's a very clear choice."

Mgr Moretti had a message to give: "We want to accompany the girl and her family. As from today, all masses will be offered for her freedom and a light shines day and night in the chapel of Our Lady."

Meanwhile, this morning, Abdul Jamil, director of the office of criminal investigations of the Kabul police force, reported that "the criminal group of Tela Mohammed, recently apprehended by the police, had contacted them to claim responsibility for the kidnapping of the Italian girl." He added: "The group made us a proposal to exchange Clementina Cantoni for their chiefs Tela Mohammed and Omara Khan and more of their arrested accomplices."

Thirty-two-year-old Clementina Cantoni of the American humanitarian organization, Care International, was kidnapped last night right from the centre of Kabul by four armed men who took her away in a Toyota. (MA)