Murder of Giulio Regeni

Giulio Regeni
Born (1988-01-15)15 January 1988
Trieste, Italy[1]
Disappeared 25 January 2016 (aged 28)
Cairo, Egypt
Body discovered 3 February 2016
Cairo–Alexandria highway
Cairo, Egypt[2]
Nationality Italian

Giulio Regeni (English pronunciation: /ˈdʒuːljoʊ ˈrɛdʒəni/;Italian pronunciation: [ˈdʒuljo ˈredʒeni] 15 January 1988[1] – 2016) was an Italian Cambridge University graduate who was abducted and tortured to death in Egypt.[3][4] Regeni was a PhD student at Girton College, Cambridge,[5] researching Egypt's independent trade unions,[6] and an employee of the private intelligence agency Oxford Analytica.[7] He grew up in Fiumicello, a comune in the Province of Udine province of northeast Italy.[8]

Discovery of the body

Regeni's mutilated and half-naked corpse was found in a ditch alongside the Cairo-Alexandria highway on the outskirts of Cairo on February 3, 2016. His recovered body showed signs of extreme torture: contusions and abrasions all over from a severe beating; extensive bruising from kicks, punches, and assault with a stick; more than two dozen bone fractures, among them seven broken ribs, all fingers and toes, as well as legs, arms, and shoulder blades; multiple stab wounds on the body including the soles of the feet, possibly from an ice pick or awl-like instrument; numerous cuts over the entire body made with a sharp instrument suspected to be a razor; extensive cigarette burns; a larger burn mark between the shoulder blades made with a hard and hot object; a brain hemorrhage; and a broken cervical vertebra, which ultimately caused death.

Investigations

Italian and Egyptian officials conducted separate autopsies on Regeni's corpse with an Egyptian forensic official reporting on March 1, 2016, that he was interrogated and tortured for up to seven days at intervals of 10–14 hours before he was finally killed.[9] The Egyptian autopsy findings have still not been made public. A 300-page report of the Italian autopsy findings has been handed over to the public prosecutor's office in Rome and denies earlier reports of signs of electric shocks administered to Regeni's genitals.[10]

On March 24, 2016, Egyptian police killed four men in a shoot out who were allegedly responsible for kidnapping Regeni.[11] According to a Facebook post from the official page of the Ministry of the Interior,[12] the gang specialized in kidnapping foreigners and stealing their money. In a raid on the flat of one of the gang members, the Egyptian police claim they found various items that belonged to Regeni including his passport and student photo IDs. However, the New Cairo prosecutor's office later denied that the criminal gang was involved in his murder.[13]

Accusations against the Egyptian government

Due to Regeni's research activities and left-wing political leanings, the security services of Abdel Fattah al-Sisi's government are strongly suspected of involvement in his murder,[14] although Egypt's media and government deny this and claim secret undercover agents belonging to the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood carried out the crime in order to embarrass the Egyptian government and destabilize relations between Italy and Egypt.[15][16]

On April 21, 2016 Reuters reported three Egyptian intelligence officials and three police sources independently claiming Regeni was in police custody at some time before his death. According to these sources he was picked up by plainclothes police officers near Gamal Abdel Nasser metro station together with another Egyptian man on the evening of Jan 25th. Both men were then taken in a white minibus with police license plates to Izbakiya police station in downtown Cairo.[17] This was later denied by a Homeland Security official and the Interior Ministry as having "no base in truth".

Reactions of the international community

Banner "Truth about Giulio Regeni" (Verità per Giulio Regeni) on the city hall in Turin, Italy

The gruesome torture and murder of Giulio Regeni sparked a global outrage,[18] with more than 4,600 academics signing a petition calling for an investigation into his death and into the many disappearances that take place in Egypt each month,[19] while on February 24, 2016, Amnesty International Italy launched a campaign "Verità per Giulio Regeni" (Truth about Giulio Regeni).[20] An online petition was also started on Change.org that received more than 100,000 signatures.[21]

On March 10, 2016, the European Parliament in Strasbourg passed a motion for a resolution condemning the torture and killing of Giulio Regeni and the ongoing human rights abuses of the al-Sisi government in Egypt. The resolution was passed with an overwhelming majority.[22]

References

  1. 1 2 "Regeni, i documenti fatti ritrovare dalla polizia egiziana". Repubblica.it (in Italian).
  2. ↑ http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-35490825
  3. ↑ "Italian student found dead in Cairo 'killed by violent blow to the head'". The Guardian.
  4. ↑ http://time.com/4285659/giulio-regeni-italian-student-torture-murder-egypt/
  5. ↑ "Cambridge University student Giulio Regeni 'was tortured and suffered burns' in Egypt, claim reports". Cambridge News.
  6. ↑ "Italy Summons Egyptian Ambassador Over Death of Student in Cairo". The Wall Street Journal. 4 February 2016.
  7. ↑ "Biography of Giulio Regeni, Cambridge University". 31 March 2016.
  8. ↑ "Il Friuli - Fiumicello piange Giulio Regeni" (in Italian). Il Friuli.
  9. ↑ "Italian killed in Egypt was interrogated for days - forensics expert". Reuters. 1 March 2016. Retrieved 2016-03-11.
  10. ↑ "Nuove torture e vecchie bugie. In un dossier il martirio di Giulio". La Stampa (in Italian). 30 March 2016. Retrieved 2016-03-31.
  11. ↑ "Egyptian police claim to shoot dead gang that killed Giulio Regeni". The Guardian. 25 March 2016. Retrieved 2016-03-25.
  12. ↑ https://www.facebook.com/MoiEgy/posts/1056819944361668:0 (in Arabic)
  13. ↑ "Egypt Prosecutor Says Killed ‘Gang Members’ and Giulio Regeni ‘Not Connected’". Egyptian Streets. 24 March 2016. Retrieved 2016-03-25.
  14. ↑ "Suspicion falls on Egypt’s security forces after the violent death of a young Italian". The Economist. 17 February 2016. Retrieved 18 February 2016.
  15. ↑ "Egypt: Italian's killers may have had criminal or revenge motive". BBC News. 24 February 2016. Retrieved 25 February 2016.
  16. ↑ "Egypt: Egypt president suggests his political enemies murdered Italian student". The Guardian. 16 March 2016. Retrieved 20 March 2016.
  17. ↑ "Exclusive: Egyptian police detained Italian student before his murder - sources". Reuters. 21 April 2016. Retrieved 22 April 2016.
  18. ↑ "Outrage Over an Italian Student’s Murder in Egypt". The New York Times. 11 February 2016. Retrieved 12 February 2016.
  19. ↑ "Thousands of academics demand inquiry into Cairo death of Giulio Regeni". The Guardian. 8 February 2016. Retrieved 2016-02-22.
  20. ↑ "Verità per Giulio Regeni". Amnesty International (in Italian). 24 February 2016. Retrieved 2016-03-26.
  21. ↑ Giovanni Parmeggiani. "Verità sull'uccisione di Giulio Regeni #JusticeForGiulio". change.org.
  22. ↑ "European parliament condemns killing of Giulio Regeni in Egypt". The Guardian. 10 March 2016. Retrieved 2016-03-11.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Murder of Giulio Regeni.
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Thursday, May 05, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.