Giuliano Amato pinned the mystery Itavia Flight 870 crash on a NATO attempt to assassinate Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi

Former Italian Prime Minister Giuliano Amato has claimed in a new interview that the ‘Ustica massacre’ incident in 1980 was caused by a botched French and US attempt to shoot down a plane which they believed was carrying Libya’s late leader.

The exact cause of the deadly incident with Itavia flight 870 from Bologna to Sicily on June 27, 1980 is still a mystery and the perpetrators remain unidentified. The McDonnell Douglas DC-9 crashed between the islands of Ponza and Ustica, killing all 81 people on board.

Some believe it was caused by a terrorist bombing, but critics point to the lack of evidence of explosive residue in the debris that was recovered. Another theory claims the jet was downed accidentally in an alleged dogfight between Libyan, French, and US fighter jets in a NATO assassination attempt on an “important” Libyan politician.

“The most credible version is that of responsibility of the French air force, in complicity with the Americans and who participated in a war in the skies that evening of June 27,” Amato claimed in an explosive interview with la Repubblica published on Saturday.

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“A plan had been launched to hit the plane on which Gaddafi was flying,” Amato claimed, insisting that NATO sought to “simulate an exercise, with many planes in action, during which a missile was supposed to be fired.”

Gaddafi was reportedly supposed to return from a meeting in Yugoslavia aboard a military plane through the same airspace, but according to Amato, Italy had warned him and the Libyan leader changed his plans. NATO officials denied any military activity in the area on the night of the tragedy. 

The Elysee Palace refused to comment on Amato’s remarks on Saturday. Italy’s current prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, said her predecessor’s claims “deserve attention” but urged him to share evidence if he has any.

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Amato admitted in the interview that he has no hard evidence, but dared French President Emmanuel Macron to either confirm or refute the allegations, in order to “remove the shame that weighs on France.”

The allegations of French involvement are not new, as the Italian president and prime minister at the time of the incident, Francesco Cossiga, also blamed the crash on a French missile and said Italian spies had indeed tipped off Gaddafi about an assassination attempt.

Muammar Gaddafi was eventually brutally murdered by Western-backed rebel fighters amid a NATO bombing campaign, conducted under the pretext of a no-fly zone during Libya’s 2011 civil war.