The body of a missing Italian graduate student has been found on the outskirts of the Egyptian capital, Cairo, after his disappearance in late January.
Italy's Foreign Ministry says Giulio Regeni's body was found Wednesday in a Cairo suburb along the road that leads to the city of Alexandria. He was covered with burns and other wounds, indicating he may have been tortured.
Egyptian prosecutor Ahmed Nagi, who leads the investigation team in the case, said the cause of Regeni’s death was still being probed, adding that “all of his body, including his face” had bruises, cuts from stabbings and burns from cigarettes. Nagi said that appeared to have been a “slow death.”
The Ministry summoned the Egyptian ambassador to Rome to demand "maximum cooperation" in the investigation.
Foreign Minister Paolo Gentiloni said Thursday Italy wanted a joint investigation with Egypt to establish the truth about Regeni's death.
Speaking to national broadcaster RAI ((Radiotelevisione italiana)) on the sidelines of a Syria donors’ conference in London, Gentiloni said Italy had "firmly” asked to collaborate in the investigation for “the truth to fully emerge."
Gentiloni said he had conveyed Italy’s demand earlier Thursday to his Egyptian counterpart, Sameh Shoukry. "We owe this in particular to the family that has been stricken in an irreparable way but which at least demands to know the truth," Gentiloni said.
The 28-year-old Regeni was a graduate student at Britain's Cambridge University, and was in Egypt gathering research for his doctoral thesis. Authorities say he was going to meet a friend in downtown Cairo when he disappeared January 25, the fifth anniversary of the Arab Spring uprising that ousted longtime dictator Hosni Mubarak.
