Italy's government has promised to award citizenship to an Egyptian boy who saved 51 lives with his SOS phone call to police.
Thirteen-year old Ramy Shehata is being praised as a hero for saving everyone on board an Italian school bus that was hijacked near Milan then set on fire.
Italy is in shock after the dramatic rescue of 51 children who were allegedly taken hostage by their school bus driver who torched the vehicle, reportedly in protest at Mediterranean migrant deaths.
Italian police said one of the children caught up in the attack hid his phone from the accused hijacker so he could phone police for help.
A spokesman for Italy’s military police, Marco Palmieri, praised the quick thinking of Ramy Shehata, who hid his mobile phone when the driver confiscated the others.
Ramy Shehata (C), a middle school student who made an emergency call to the Carabinieri police from a bus with 51 schoolchildren near Milan, northern Italy. Source: ANSA
"The driver doused petrol on the bus and threatened to blow it up," Mr Palmieri told CNN.
"He requested all the children's mobile phones - but one kid managed to hide and called us."
"You know how canny kids are these days," he said.
Italy’s military police, known as the Carabinieri, said the boy helped to pinpoint the location of the bus.
"Ramy called us and had his head down looking through the glass door and was able to read the signs on the road, giving an exact location of where the bus was and where it was going," a spokesperson said.
'Little hero' praised
The office of Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini called Ramy Shehata, who is from Egypt, a "little hero" and said he would be granted speedy citizenship.
"The Interior Ministry is ready to take on the expenses and speed up the procedures to recognise citizenship for the little hero," a statement from the interior ministry said.
"The hope is to attribute... citizenship to Ramy and remove it from the bus driver," the statement said.
Ramy's father Kahled Shehata told Italy's Ansa news agency his family arrived in Italy in 2001.
"My son did his duty, it would be nice if he could now get Italian citizenship," Mr Shehata said.
Ramy Shehata (C), a middle school student who made an emergency call to the Carabinieri police from a bus with 51 schoolchildren near Milan, northern Italy. Source: IPA Milestone
School bus hijacked
The Italian driver of Senegalese origin on Wednesday hijacked the bus as it was taking the 12-13 year-olds from a gym to school in Crema, east of Milan.
Armed with two petrol canisters and a cigarette lighter, the accused Ousseynou Sy threatened the youngsters, took their telephones and told the adults to tie them up with electric cable.
According to CNN, Carabinieri spokesman Marco Palmieri said the driver allegedly yelled "I need to avenge the deaths in the Mediterranean."
The Milan police anti-terrorism unit has been charged with investigating the hostage-taking, during which Mr Sy reportedly told students: "No one is getting out of here alive."
The incident prompted Italy's populist government to demand that the driver lose his Italian citizenship.
"He blocked all the doors with chains," teaching assistant Tiziana Magarini told news agency AFP.
"He showed me a knife and told me to tie up all the children."
The 40-minute ordeal, during which the bus also slammed into a car, was brought to an end when police managed to smash windows open and get those onboard out just as the driver set fire to the vehicle.
The aftermath of the damage after bus driver Ousseynou Sy, took 51 students from the Margherita Hack school in San Donato Milanese hostage. Source: IPA Milestone
A dozen children and two adults were taken to hospital for smoke and fume inhalation, according to emergency services.
"It's crazy, absurd, it's unacceptable. Someone has to pay, and dearly," said Filippo Razzini, the father of a pupil at the school in the small town of Crema who was not on the bus.
"It's good to go back to school today because unfortunately these things are today a reality. But if it were up to me I'd be out there waiting for this guy somewhere," he told AFP.
Ousseynou Sy's lawyer said his client had wanted to "draw attention to the consequences of (Italy's) migration policies".
Italy has clamped down on immigration under far-right Interior Minister Matteo Salvini, demanding it close its ports to charity vessels rescuing migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean.
Calls to revoke bus driver's citizenship
Mr Salvini said Mr Sy should have his citizenship, granted in 2004 after his marriage to an Italian, revoked.
"We shall do all we can to ensure this nefarious person is stripped of his Italian nationality," said Mr Salvini.
Deputy Prime Minister Luigi Di Maio of the League's governing partner, the anti-establishment Five Star Movement, agreed.
"I think it is a duty to withdraw immediately the citizenship of this criminal," said Mr Di Maio.
Mr Sy could lose his citizenship if convicted of a terror attack under a tough security decree introduced last year.
Mr Salvini's far-right League party is riding high in the polls in part because of its tough anti-migrant stance.
Students at the Margherita Hack school in San Donato Milanese, near Milan, Italy. Source: ANSA
'Lone wolf'
The incident has shaken Crema's community.
"My daughter was in shock yesterday, she said 'Mummy, I could have been there too'," parent Luisa Ginelli told AFP Thursday.
The driver had no links with Islamic terrorism and "acted as a lone wolf", Alberto Nobili, head of counter-terrorism at the Milan public prosecutor's office, told a news conference.
Mr Nobili said Thursday that Mr Sy had planned the hijacking over several days and "wanted the whole world talking about his story".
He posted a video on YouTube to explain his actions and call on relatives and friends in Crema and Senegal to take action, saying: "Africa -- arise."
Mr Sy got his Italian citizenship and job in 2004 and managed to keep subsequent convictions for drink driving and sexual assault of a minor secret from his employer, the Corriere della Sera newspaper reported.
A neighbour told La Stampa newspaper that he was known as "Paolo".
"That's what we called him because his name was too complicated. I saw him go out every morning, he drove a bus. A quiet man but solitary," she said.
Colleagues told Italian media that Mr Sy's separation from his Italian wife, with whom he has two teenage children, was "when his problems started".
Additional reporting: AFP
