Italian reporter Daniele Mastrogiacomo who was kidnapped by Taliban militants in Afghanistan nine days ago, appeared in a video delivered on Wednesday to a non-governmental aid agency which works in the country.
The video sent to Emergency, a medical organisation that has done crucial work in Afghanistan, showed the reporter appealing to Premier Romano Prodi to secure his release.
"Today is March 12, it is 8 am in Afghanistan. I would like to say that I am well and launch this appeal to the government: free me," the reporter for the Rome daily La Repubblica said.
"Two Afghan colleagues and I illegally entered their territory and so I appeal to the Italian government and Premier Romano Prodi to attempt anything possible to secure our release".
Mastrogiacomo ended his appeal on an optimistic note: "I am calm and convinced that all will end well".
Gino Strada, the war doctor who has become famous through the work of his organisation Emergency, said the video was two minutes long and Mastrogiacomo appeared in good health.
He said the kidnappers made no specific requests for his release.
Italian Foreign Minister Massimo D'Alema said on Monday that Mastrogiacomo's captors had been identified and that they were a group based in southern Afghanistan.
He said Italy was working "through humanitarian channels" to secure the reporter's release.
Mastrogiacomo, 53, went missing on March 5 while attempting to interview Taliban leaders in southern Afghanistan, where NATO has just unleashed the biggest offensive since the 2001 war that toppled the Islamists.
Last week, Italian state broadcaster RAI said the Taliban want Italy to quit Afghanistan in exchange for his release.
RAI interviewed a Pakistani journalist, Rahimullah Yousefzai, who claims to be in direct touch with the Islamists holding the correspondent.
GOVERNMENT DENIES ITALIAN TROOPS INVOLVED IN COMBAT.
In another development on Wednesday, the government denied that Italian troops were taking part in joint military operations with Spanish forces in Afghanistan.
"I don't believe that it's possible for our troops to be engaged in combat operations against Taliban militants because this is not their task," Defence Undersecretary Lorenzo Forcieri told the Senate's Foreign and Defence Committees.
Forcieri's unscheduled address to the committees came hours after the Spanish press agency EFE reported that Spanish and Italian troops have been working to seal Afghanistan's southern and western borders since Monday.
The denial was pointedly aimed at pacifists in Prodi's nine-way coalition who oppose the Afghanistan mission and whose vote is needed when a bill to refinance it comes up later this month.
EFE cited the Spanish defence ministry as saying that the troops were being helped by Afghan army and police forces and that the border operations were part of the major NATO offensive against Taliban militants.
The offensive, dubbed Operation Achilles, was launched by NATO and Afghan forces last week in the southern part of the country and involves more than 4,500 NATO troops and some 1,000 Afghan soldiers.
A Spanish defence ministry spokesman told ANSA that the "the operation (referred to by EFE) was being carried out by Spanish troops" and that there was no news that Italian soldiers were taking part.
He stressed that since the Spaniards are technically under the leadership of Italian General Antonio Satta - regional commander of the western sector - the Spanish media may have misconstrued and involved Italian troops in their report.
Forcieri said Italian soldiers were patrolling travel routes and borders along their assigned sector to prevent Taliban militants from spilling into the strife-torn southern areas.
"These tasks are in keeping with assignments and rules of engagement foreseen for that (western) area. In short, they are just getting on with their job".
Italy's 1,900-strong contingent in Afghanistan is a peacekeeping force, so the EFE reports ruffled pacifists, most of them hard leftists who have reluctantly agreed to support the Afghan mission providing Italian troops are not involved in military operations.
They would prefer Italy to pull out altogether, arguing that Afghanistan has become too dangerous for peacekeeping activities.
The Communist Refoundation Party, one of nine parties in the governing alliance, said on Wednesday that "we remain firmly against the involvement of the Italian army in war actions. (Foreign Minister Massimo) D'Alema and (Defence Minister Arturo) Parisi have always said our troops would not take part in actions of this type. We want clarification".
Pacifists and leftists are planning a major demonstration on Saturday to call for a troop pullout.
