World Notes Italy

It began with a bang and seems likely to end with a whimper. The bang: the gunshots fired at Pope John Paul II on May 13, 1981, by Turkish Terrorist Mehmet Ali Agca. The whimper: Italian Prosecutor Antonio Marini's recommendation last week that three Bulgarian defendants charged with complicity in the attack be acquitted on the technical ground of "insufficient evidence." If the court heeds Marini's advice when it hands down its verdict this month, the result will be a stunning blow to the * "Bulgarian Connection" theory, which maintained that Bulgarian intelligence services organized the papal attack at the behest of the Soviet Union.

For all that, Marini seemed to believe that the Bulgarians were guilty. He rejected their alibis and complained of being denied access to key witnesses. He also came down hard on three Turks who are being tried in the case, asking life sentences for two and a 24-year term for the third. The Soviet Union, for its part, was jubilant over the call for the Bulgarians' acquittal. Radio Moscow said the recommendation proved that the conspiracy charges were fabricated by the CIA and its Western allies "to discredit Bulgaria and other socialist countries."