Leading Italian prelate deplores gruesome murder of migrants

June 04, 2026

The vice president of the Italian Episcopal Conference deplored the gruesome murder of four migrants from Afghanistan and Pakistan who were working in slave-like conditions in Amendolara, a small town in Calabria.

“Polite words, composed communiqués, ritual phrases that last a day and then are swallowed up by the dust of the news are not enough,” said Bishop Francesco Savino of nearby Cassano all’Jonio. “I ask the State to be there with all its strength, not only after the bloodshed, but before: in the countryside, in the agricultural supply chains, in the places where labor is recruited, in undignified housing, in opaque transport, in irregular labor relations, in pockets of vulnerability.”

“The testimony currently being gathered by investigators from the sole survivor of the tragedy also points to the dominance of mafia groups, specifically a Pakistani mafia group, within the context of the caporalato system involving foreign laborers employed in the fields,” the Vatican newspaper reported.

 

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Further information:

• Quattro corpi nel fuoco, una coscienza in cenere (Diocesi di Cassano all’Jonio, 6/2/26)
• 4 migrant farm workers in Italy burned to death in car, according to survivor, police (6/3/26)Reuters, 6/
• Orrore per la strage dei braccianti (L'Osservatore Romano, 6/2/26)