France offers 1980 Ustica disaster files, prompting Rome prosecutors to resume inquiry
Rome prosecutors will withdraw their request to close the Ustica air disaster inquiry after France offered to transfer defense records spanning from 1980 to the 1990s.
Diplomatic note and reopened proceedings
On 21 September 2026, the French Embassy in Rome sent an official note to Italy's Ministry of Foreign Affairs offering full access to French state records regarding the 27 June 1980 Ustica air disaster. The communication travelled through the Italian Prime Minister's Office and the Ministry of Justice before reaching the Rome Prosecutor's Office. Chief prosecutor Francesco Lo Voi announced that prosecutors will formally withdraw their request to archive the ongoing investigations during a court hearing scheduled for 30 September 2026 before a judge for preliminary investigations. The prosecution had previously requested to shelve the combined case in March 2025 after decades of unfulfilled international legal assistance requests. French authorities also confirmed their willingness to answer any follow-up inquiries that Italian judicial officials submit concerning military activity during the incident.
French military archives and radar records
The documents offered by Paris include French Ministry of Defence records spanning from 1980 through the early 1990s. Italian magistrates maintain the hypothesis that an aerial engagement caused the crash of the Itavia Douglas DC-9, which fell into the Tyrrhenian Sea along its Bologna to Palermo route, killing all 81 people on board. The newly promised documentation could provide prosecutors with verified data on French naval fleet movements across the Mediterranean and radar recordings gathered during the night of the flight. Italian judicial authorities had submitted multiple letters rogatory to France across past decades to obtain these military records, but the requests previously remained unanswered. Prosecutors intend to deposit the French diplomatic note into the court case file at the opening of the 30 September 2026 hearing.
- Itavia Flight 870 crashes into the Tyrrhenian Sea, killing 81 people on board
- Rome prosecutors open an inquiry following statements by Francesco Cossiga
- Court of Cassation rules a missile caused the crash and affirms past cover-ups
- Second inquiry opens following a filing by the Ustica truth association
- Giuliano Amato alleges a French missile struck the plane targeting Muammar Gaddafi
- Rome prosecutors request to shelve the combined investigations
- French Embassy sends an official note offering defense archives to Italy
- Rome prosecutors schedule court appearance to withdraw the shelving request
Four decades of legal inquiries
The active investigation in Rome merges two separate files opened against unknown persons in 2008 and 2022. The 2008 inquiry began after former Italian President Francesco Cossiga publicly attributed the crash to a French military missile aimed at a Libyan aircraft. In 2013, Italy's Court of Cassation concluded that a missile strike from an unidentified source brought down the airliner, adding that cover-ups during subsequent inquiries were definitively established. Former Italian Prime Minister Giuliano Amato renewed scrutiny of the event in 2023 by asserting that French air forces fired the missile during an operation targeting late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. The second file originated in 2022 following a legal petition presented by an association dedicated to uncovering the facts behind the disaster.
Political and victim family reactions
Representatives of the victims' families welcomed the diplomatic development after requesting Italian government intervention during bilateral contacts in mid-June 2026. Daria Bonfietti, president of the association representing the families of the Ustica victims, credited the diplomatic outreach between Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and French President Emmanuel Macron for breaking the impasse.
We asked for non-archiving and this is arriving, it will be suspended. It is a great result. I have always said that if the judiciary cannot do it, only politics can. The moment the government took action, results appeared. Now we will try to understand what documentation arrives.
Democratic Party lawmaker Andrea De Maria also noted that the withdrawal of the shelving request creates new judicial opportunities for resolving unanswered questions surrounding the flight. Bologna Mayor Matteo Lepore sent a letter to Meloni urging continued institutional focus on the investigation.
If confirmed, this choice would mark a historic step for our country and for the search for truth. For too many decades the grief of the families of the 81 victims of the DC-9 Itavia met with silence, omissions and document disclosures that were never fully clarified. The fact that the Rome Prosecutor's Office can now withdraw the shelving request opens an entirely new phase for the legal proceedings.
