Gunman Set to Implicate Bulgaria in Pope Assassination Attempt

The pope met and forgave Agca in 1983 while the gunman was serving a 19-year sentence in an Italian prison. Photo by flickr.com

The gunman who attempted to assassinate Pope John Paul II in 1981, Mehmet Ali Agca, has said he will answer questions after he is released from jail in Turkey next week.

Agca said in a letter given to reporters Wednesday "I will answer to all of these questions in the next weeks."

The pope met and forgave Agca in 1983 while the gunman was serving a 19-year sentence in an Italian prison. On Monday, Agca ends another 10-year prison sentence for killing a Turkish journalist in 1979.

In 1981, John Paul II was shot and critically wounded in St Peter's Square by Turk Mehmet Ali Agca, an expert gunman. Sovfiet spies were blamed for allegedly ordering the assassination attempt.

Mehmet Ali Agca later admitted he had two Bulgarian accomplices in Rome at the time, including Zilo Vassilev, the Bulgarian military attache in Italy.

He claims to have received two months of training in weaponry and terrorist tactics in Syria as a member of the left-wing Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine paid for by the Communist Bulgarian government, although this has been questioned.