3 Missionaries Seized in Sudan but One Escapes

One of three Jesuit priests reported seized by Sudanese rebels managed to escape and has reached Zaire by trekking through 220 miles of tropical forest and animal reserves, his order said Friday.

Father Pio Ciampa, a 60-old-old Italian missionary of the Roman Catholic order, fled the town of Maridi, about 190 miles west of Juba, when it was attacked by rebels July 13, Father Edward Trudeau said. Juba is the provincial capital of southern Sudan, where the rebels operate.

“He’s a very fit, very strong man for his age, and I can imagine he walked all those days with ease,” said Trudeau, a French Canadian at the Jesuit Provincial Residence in Nairobi, the order’s headquarters for East Africa.

No Word on Other Two

Trudeau said there was no word on the fate of the two other priests, Salvador Ferrau, 45, of Goa, India, and Josef Pullicino, 36, of Malta. Vatican radio said Wednesday that they and Ciampa had been kidnaped.

Last week, the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army claimed to have seized Tore in the latest of several offensives in the south.