Italy has summoned Iran’s ambassador to demand the immediate release of an Italian journalist detained in Tehran.
Cecilia Sala, a reporter for the Il Foglio daily newspaper, was detained in Tehran on December 19, six days after she arrived on a journalist’s visa.
Tehran confirmed on Monday that Ms Sala had been arrested on charges of violating the laws of the Islamic Republic of Iran, according to the state-run IRNA news agency.
The Italian foreign ministry said it summoned Iran’s ambassador Mohammad Reza Sabouri to demand her release and to ensure “dignified detention conditions in full respect of human rights,” including consular access and visitations.
Italy’s opposition Democratic Party also demanded her immediate release, citing Italian media reports about a phone call Ms Sala’s family received from her indicating she was sleeping on the floor and had not received a second package of personal items from the embassy.
“The news of her conditions of detention are alarming,” the Democrats said in a statement. “The inhuman treatment she is undergoing is unacceptable.”
Ms Sala’s case has dominated Italian headlines for days and even featured in president Sergio Mattarella’s end-of-year speech to the nation.
Complicating matters are indications that Ms Sala’s fate has become intertwined with that of an Iranian man detained in Italy on December 16. Mohammad Abedini-Najafabad was arrested at Milan’s Malpensa airport on a US warrant alleging he was involved in the January 28, 2024, drone attack in Jordan that killed three American troops.
US federal prosecutors have charged Abedini and a co-defendant with export control violations after FBI specialists analysed the drone navigation system used in the Jordan attack and traced it to them.
The US Justice Department declined to comment on whether there was a link between the Sala case and its drone investigation.
Abedini’s Italian lawyer, Alfredo De Francesco, asked the Milan court this week to grant him house arrest. Mr De Francesco said the decision is pending. He declined to respond when asked to comment on the US charges or possible links to the Sala case.
Italian media have reported that Ms Sala is essentially being used as a bargaining chip by Iran to secure Abedini’s release. Italian foreign minister Antonio Tajani did not dispute that scenario when he was asked about it during a call-in to the Rete4 broadcast Sunday.
Ever since the 1979 US Embassy crisis in Iran, in which dozens of US hostages spent 444 days in captivity in Tehran, Iran has frequently used prisoners with Western ties as bargaining chips in negotiations.
