DECLARATION ON CONSTRUCTION OF PARKING LOT

VATICAN CITY, OCT 29, 1999 (VIS) - Given below are excerpts from the declaration, made this afternoon by Holy See Press Office Director Joaquin Navarro-Valls, concerning the construction of an underground parking lot near Vatican City:

"I reiterate that, during excavation work for the parking lot on the Janiculum Hill, within Vatican territory, no archaeological finds were made.

"This fact has also been noted by experts from the administration of the Vatican's Classical Antiquities Section who, invited to visit the site during the initial phases (in which the strata most exposed to anthropic action were being excavated), found nothing of any archaeological interest during their investigations. As excavation continued no historical or archaeological material came to light.

"Although the site is situated in an extraterritorial zone, the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples entrusted the overseeing and supervision of works to a special surveillance commission made up of authoritative technical experts from both Italy and the Vatican."

"All phases of the work, therefore, were carried out under the close and assiduous supervision of these experts."

"It is simply ridiculous to affirm that the material excavated was dumped furtively and under cover of darkness."

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