Witness History
Witness History
Vatican citizen Emanuela Orlandi disappears
Up next
December 14, 2023
9 minutes
Available for over a year
In 1983, the disappearance of a teenage girl who was a citizen of Vatican City led to a scandal.
When Pope John Paul II made a public appeal to the people holding Emanuela Orlandi captive, the world took notice and her case was treated as a suspected kidnapping.
Forty years on, the reason she vanished is still unclear.
Emanuela’s brother, Pietro Orlandi, speaks to Daniel Gordon about his life-long mission to find out what really happened to his sister.
(Photo: A protester holds a photo of Emanuela. Credit: Stefano Montesi/Corbis/Getty Images)