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The shooting occurred as the Pope was being driven in his open-top jeep among over 10,000 pilgrims in St Peter's Square in Rome prior to a general audience. Two bullets fired from a 9 mm Browning pistol hit the Pope in the abdomen, the right arm and the left hand, and also wounded two American women tourists, Mrs Anne Odre (60), from Buffalo (New York State), and Mrs Rose Hall (21), the wife of a Protestant chaplain with US troops in West Germany. Pope John Paul was immediately driven to the Gemelli hospital where he underwent a five-hour operation for the removal of parts of his intestines. Doctors at the hospital said that the bullet which had entered the Pope's stomach had not damaged any vital organs and that the operation to repair the wound had been successful.

The Pope's assailant, who was immediately arrested by the Italian police, was later named as Mr Mebmet Ali Agca (23), who had confessed in July 1979 to the murder in the previous February of Mr Abdi Ipekci, editor of the influential independent Turkish newspaper Milliyet , and who had subsequently been sentenced in absentia to death in April 1980, having escaped from prison in November 1979 . Shortly after his escape Mr Agca, in a letter to Milliyet, threatened to kill the Pope during the latter's visit to Turkey which took place at the end of November 1979 .

The letter said: "The Western imperialists, who are afraid of Turkey establishing with her brothers, the Islamic countries, a new political, military and economic power in the Middle East, are sending over the commander of the masked crusaders, Pope John Paul, to Turkey. If this untimely visit is not cancelled I will shoot the Pope. The only reason for my escape from prison is this."

Mr Agca was charged on May 14 with the attempted murder of the Pope, equivalent under Italian law to an attack on a head of state, and of Mrs Odre and Mrs Hall. He was also charged with illegal possession of arms, falsifying a passport, illegal possession of a passport and assuming a false identity.

The Turkish police believed that after his escape Mr Agca fled to Iran, then returned to Turkey, picked up a forged passport and crossed the country's north-western border into Bulgaria. From there he was thought to have made his way into West Germany by way of Yugoslavia and Austria, and later to have travelled fairly widely in Western Europe, visiting France, Switzerland and other countries. According to the Italian police, he first came to Italy in November or December 1980 staying at the same hotel in Rome where he stayed immediately before the assassination attempt.

He was in Rome again at the end of January 1981, and a few days later turned up in Milan, where he narrowly escaped arrest after his presence in the city had been reported to the police by the Turkish consulate. In April he registered as a student at the University for Foreigners at Perugia, in central Italy, and attended two Italian classes. On April 23 he was again in Milan, where he booked a package tour to Spain at a travel agency, paying almost $500 for a two-week visit to Palma de Mallorca, including air fare, hotel and meals. He left Milan on April 25 and on his return on May 9 was believed to have boarded a train at the small town of Busto Arsizio, about 32 km north-east of Milan on the road to Malpensa. He arrived again in Rome on May 11

Having been declared to be out of danger on May 23, Pope John Paul returned to the Vatican on June 3. Because of the assassination attempt a pastoral visit which he was to have paid to Switzerland from May 31 to June 5 was cancelled. (L'Osservatore Romano - Times - Guardian - International Herald Tribune)

This article comes from Keesings Worldwide Online

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