44 years ago today, May 13, 1981 (April 10, 1981, lunar calendar), Pope Paul II was assassinated. Pope stabbed and wounded in St. Peter's Basilica On May 13, 1981, Pope John Paul II was shot by an assassin who attempted to assassinate him. When he appeared in a convertible among 10,000 worshippers in St. Peter's Square, a fugitive Turkish criminal injured him. The Pope, who has been shot twice in the abdomen, is giving his weekly sermon to believers. He was rushed to Gamelli Hospital in Rome and underwent emergency surgery that lasted more than five hours. His bowel was partially removed. Although his condition is classified as "intensive care," a spokesman is confident that "the Pope will recover soon." Police arrested the assassin and identified him as Mohammed Ali Agoka, 23 years old. Turkish news agency Anatolia reported that Akka was accused of killing Abdi Ipeki, editor of the newspaper "Weiyan" in 1979 and escaped from prison that year. He wrote to the newspaper claiming that he had escaped prison to kill the Pope who was planning to visit Ankara and Istanbul. Police found a note on Agoka's body that read: "I killed Paul in protest against the imperialist policies of the Soviet Union and the United States." Protest the genocide in El Salvador and Afghanistan." John Paul II became Pope after the death of his predecessor in October 1978. After the Pope was assassinated, he still smiled and said to the murderer: I have forgiven you