Two newly uncovered intelligence memos from 1983 have reignited debate over whether a ransom was paid following the disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi, the 15-year-old Vatican citizen who vanished on June 22 of that year.
The documents, dated July 27 and August 12, were produced by Italy’s former military intelligence agency and recently recovered from a government archive previously believed to be empty.
The July memo contains claims that a ransom had already been paid and that important information was known to be circulating within Vatican circles at the time. It also references the possible transfer of the victim from one group of captors to another, and mentions a confidential report allegedly sent by Italy’s ambassador to the Holy See to senior officials.
The second memo refers to a Vatican meeting held on August 11, 1983, involving investigators. According to the file, a senior Vatican official denied any payment or contact with the kidnappers during the meeting. The memo also records the official directing suspicion toward a foreign national with ties to the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music.
The files were located in a 459-page dossier held in Italy’s Central State Archives in 2014. Their content has raised concerns over the Vatican’s repeated claims that no internal documentation exists on the case.
The Orlandi family’s legal representative has renewed calls for full disclosure, urging the Vatican to hand over any related records to both prosecutors and the parliamentary commission.
The documents are now being analyzed as part of a broader investigation, which continues to examine the handling of the case and the early involvement of multiple intelligence services.
Their emergence forms part of an ongoing parliamentary inquiry into the Orlandi case and other unresolved disappearances from the same era.
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