Wilson Quits as Ambassador to Vatican

William A. Wilson, a close friend of President Reagan who embarrassed the Administration earlier this year by meeting secretly with Libya’s Col. Moammar Kadafi, has resigned as U.S. ambassador to the Vatican, the State Department announced Tuesday.

Department spokesman Charles Redman said that Wilson, a wealthy California rancher and land developer, left his post because he wants to return to private life.

Redman refused to say whether Wilson’s resignation was linked to his unauthorized meeting with Kadafi. Secretary of State George P. Shultz had earlier reprimanded the ambassador for meeting with the Libyan leader.

Reagan Tells Appreciation

“The President expressed his deep appreciation to Ambassador Wilson for his productive work, during the course of which full diplomatic relations were established between the United States and the Holy See,” Redman said.

Wilson, 71, became the first U.S. ambassador to the Vatican in more than a century on April 9, 1984, when the United States and the Holy See opened full diplomatic relations. He had served as Reagan’s personal representative to the Vatican before the diplomatic ties were established.

Wilson served more than five years on the job. Under a special ruling, he was allowed to retain his seat on several corporate boards, a departure from the usual State Department policy.

A convert to Catholicism, Wilson became wealthy through involvement in the oil business, real estate and livestock. He is a longstanding member of Reagan’s “kitchen cabinet” of wealthy unofficial advisers.

Met Kadafi in March

Wilson’s unauthorized meeting with Kadafi took place in late March, after the United States had accused the Libyan leader of responsibility for the terrorist attacks on the Rome and Vienna airports late last year.

When news of the meeting leaked out, Reagan expressed full confidence in Wilson. Shultz, however, said later that Wilson did not inform his superiors about his meeting with Kadafi and that it “creates a problem for us in that we have been telling everybody that we have withdrawn ourselves from Kadafi, so obviously it’s an embarrassment.”

But Shultz added: “He is a very fine man, and if you consider what’s happened in our relationships with the Vatican since he’s been the presidential envoy, you’d have to judge that in a very quiet way a great deal has been accomplished.”

Wilson has never disclosed what he had hoped to accomplish by the meeting with Kadafi, which marked his second controversy while serving the Administration.

Criticized by Justice Dept.

In July, 1984, just three months after the establishment of diplomatic relations with the Vatican, the Justice Department criticized the ambassador for trying to intervene in two international criminal investigations.

At that time, it was reported that Wilson intervened in the investigations of Marc Rich, the fugitive financier, and Archbishop Paul C. Marcinkus, the Vatican banker.

Wilson is a graduate of Stanford University. He is a former member of the Board of Regents of the University of California and was part of the group that screened appointments for the Reagan Cabinet in 1980 and 1981.