Giovanni Castellaneta

Giovanni Castellaneta (born September 11, 1942 in Gravina in Puglia ) is a former Italian ambassador to the United States .

Life

Castellaneta closed in 1965 to study law at the University of La Sapienza in Rome from. In 1967 he entered the diplomatic service. From 1972 to 1974 he was deputy head of the embassy in Mogadishu , from 1974 to 1976 he was accredited as a commercial attaché in Lisbon . From 1997 to 1998 he was special coordinator of the Italian reconstruction program in Albania . Castellaneta has been the foreign policy advisor to Giuliano Amato and later to Silvio Berlusconi since 2000 . He was instrumental in passing on the papers later recognized as forgery, which were supposed to prove the delivery of Yellowcake from Niger to Saddam Hussein . These papers, although recognized by the CIA as forgeries, were cited by the US government as a reason to start the Iraq war .

The Nigerien ambassador to Rome, Adam Maiga Zakariaou, and the ambassador Laura Montini, alias La Signora , wrote documents which were supposed to prove the purchase of yellowcake by the Iraqi regime under Saddam Hussein in Niger. Nicolò Pollari , the head of the Italian military intelligence service, Servizio per le Informazioni e la Sicurezza Militare , was to hand over the documents to the CIA on Berlusconi's instructions , which, however, showed no interest. Castellaneta then advised Pollari to launch the documents on the official channels via Michael Ledeen .

Castellaneta was from 2002 to 2005 chairman of the supervisory board of Finmeccanica . Until the end of 2016, Castellaneta was President of SACE SpA, an Italian export credit insurance company . He is married to Leila Castellaneta.

Awards (excerpt)

• Large Silver Decoration on Ribbon for Services to the Republic of Austria (2002)
• Honorary Companions with Breast Star des National Order of Merit (2004)
• Commander (1990), Grand Officer (2002) and Grand Cross (2005) of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic

Web links

• Brief description of Giovanni Castellaneta with pictures on the Washington Life magazine website

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original from March 20, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
2. ↑ The Times , April 15, 2004, Executed Italian struggled and 'died a hero' , Gianni Castellaneta, his diplomatic adviser
3. ^ The Times , April 9, 2006, 'Forgers' of key Iraq was contract named

predecessor	Office	successor
Sergio Vento	Italian Ambassador to Washington 2005–2009	Giulio Terzi di Sant'Agata