Body of Italian student found in Cairo flown back to Italy

The Italian news agency ANSA said that the body will be transported for an autopsy ordered by Rome prosecutors who are investigating his death. Multiple stab wounds and cigarette burns were evident, indicating torture and a “slow death”, according to Egyptian prosecutor Ahmed Nagy.

However, Gen. Khaled Shalaby, head of the Giza investigations department, said on Thursday that an investigation would be unlikely as there were no signs of criminal intent, adding that Regeni died from a traffic accident.

“What we are certainly doing is urging the Egyptian government to allow Italian authorities a joint investigation, to return the boy’s body to his family as soon as possible, to collaborate”.

“We had to view the results of the autopsy”, Minister Alfano said, referring to Italian authorities.

The Italian ambassador’s vehicle leaves the Italian Hospital in Cairo after a a private mass at the church in the hospital complex for slain Italian graduate student Giulio Regeni on Friday, Feb. 5, 2016.

Regeni had disappeared after leaving home in a smart district of Cairo to meet a friend, according to another friend. His body was found at the start of the main road between Cairo and Alexandria. Anxious about the spread of the Islamic State group in Egypt’s neighbor Libya, Rome hopes it can count on Cairo as a dependable ally in the fight against violent extremism. Scores of people have disappeared since 2013.

Italy sent a police and forensics team to Egypt to assist the investigation.

Regeni’s parents, who came to Egypt to search for him and friends, attended the memorial held inside an Italian church, which was heavily guarded by security forces and with plainclothes intelligence officers and police patrolling the area. His half-naked body which showed signs of torture was found in a roadside ditch on the outskirts of Cairo early on Wednesday.

“What happened is very worrying”, he said.

In an interview with Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, Egypt’s foreign minister vehemently denied those allegations as “judgments, accusations and insinuations, unjustified and without proof”.

A copy of Regeni’s CV, provided by another friend, indicated he spoke four languages and had won several scholarships.

Regeni who was a Cambridge University doctoral student went missing in Cairo on January 25, as the country marked the the fifth anniversary of the uprising that ended Hosni Mubarak’s 30-year rule.