Envoy Luca Attanasio and Vittorio Iacovacci who were killed in a roadside ambush in the Democratic Republic of the Congo"honoured" Italy, foreign minister Antonio Tajani tweeted on the third anniversary of their deaths.
"Today it moves me to remember Ambassador Luca Attanasio and Carabiniere Vittorio Iacovacci on the third anniversary of their tragic deaths," Tajani wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
"Two servants of the state, who with dedication and commitment brought honour to Italy until their extreme sacrifice," the tweet added.
Attanasio and Iacovacci were travelling in a two-vehicle convoy with seven people along a road in the Virunga National Park in the Congolese province of North Kivu when gunmen attacked the convoy.
The convoy had no security escort as it drove from the provincial capital of Goma to a UN World Food Programme school feeding project in Rutshuru, a town 70 kilometres north of Goma.
Iacovacci was mortally wounded in the gunfire and Attanasio was shot in the abdomen and succumbed to his injuries before arriving at a hospital in Goma. Local UN driver Mustapha Milambo died at scene of the ambush.
