Italy summons Iran’s ambassador over journalist Cecilia Sala’s arrest

Italy has summoned Iran’s ambassador to demand the immediate release of an Italian journalist who was detained in Tehran in December, as the government and opposition ramp up public pressure on the politically sensitive case.

Cecilia Sala, a reporter for the Il Foglio daily newspaper, was arrested in Tehran on 19 December, six days after she arrived in the country on a journalist’s visa.

Tehran confirmed on Monday that 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 agency did not give any further details about which laws Sala had allegedly broken.

The Italian foreign ministry said it had 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 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.”

Il Foglio said shortly after her detention, that she was being held in Tehran’s Evin prison, a detention facility notorious for holding dissidents.

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 Sala’s fate has become intertwined with that of an Iranian man who was detained in Italy on 16 December, just three days before Sala’s arrest.

Mohammad Abedini-Najafabad was arrested at Milan’s Malpensa airport on a US warrant alleging he was involved in the 28 January 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, a decision that is pending, De Francesco said in an email.

He declined to respond when asked to comment on the US charges or possible links to the Sala case.

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Italian media have reported that Sala is essentially being used as a bargaining chip by Iran to secure Abedini’s release.

Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani didn’t 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.