MADRID

After 35 years of silence and lack of cooperation, the Vatican on Wednesday decided to open its own investigation into the case of Emanuela Orlandi, a 15-year-old Vatican citizen who disappeared in the summer of 1983.

Laura Sgro, the lawyer of the Orlandi family, and Emanuela's brother Pietro have confirmed the probe to the Italian media.

Daughter of a Vatican employee, Orlandi had disappeared mysteriously in Rome.

Despite recurrent speculations in the media that the remains of her body were found, there was nothing solid in her case for decades.

Obsessed with the fate of Orlandi, many rumors have swirled over the years about what happened to her.

Conspiracy theories tied her cold case to the mafia and even to the plot to assassinate Pope John Paul II.

Orlandi disappeared when Mehmet Ali Agca, the Turkish national who was then charged with plotting to assassinate the Pope was in jail.