Giulio Regeni Case: Rome Trial of Four Egyptian Officers

The Giulio Regeni case is the Italian criminal prosecution of four Egyptian National Security Agency officers accused of kidnapping, torturing, and murdering a 28-year-old Cambridge PhD student in Cairo in early 2016. The four are being tried in absentia in Rome, and the proceedings remain open in 2026.

Who Giulio Regeni Was

Regeni was an Italian doctoral candidate at the University of Cambridge, affiliated with Girton College and the Department of Politics and International Studies. His research examined Egypt’s independent trade union movement, with a focus on Cairo’s street vendors. Cambridge later described his fieldwork as “wholly legitimate academic research” using “standard academic methods.”¹ He spoke Arabic, had worked in Egypt before, and had lived in Cairo since November 2015, spending time in markets and union meetings.²

In December 2015, a woman photographed him at a meeting of independent unions. On January 7, 2016, Mohamed Abdallah, head of the independent street vendors’ union, reported Regeni to Egyptian authorities. Abdallah later said Regeni’s questions “were not about street vendors” and “had other intentions,” while denying he was a government informant.² Egypt’s prosecution general confirmed the tip and acknowledged that Regeni was placed under investigation, though officials said they concluded his work posed no threat.³

The Disappearance and the Body

On the evening of January 25, 2016, the fifth anniversary of Egypt’s 2011 revolution, Regeni texted his girlfriend “I am going out” as he headed into central Cairo. No one outside Egyptian custody saw him alive again.²

His body was found on February 3, 2016, by a driver on the road between Cairo and Alexandria. Italian autopsy results showed he had been beaten repeatedly with kicks, fists, sticks, and clubs, and had sustained broken hands, broken feet, a broken neck, burns, and cuts. Forensic analysis indicated the torture lasted at least six or seven days before he died.² The site where the body turned up was later identified as close to a detention facility used by Egypt’s National Security Agency.⁴

Egypt’s Shifting Explanations

Egyptian authorities offered a series of accounts that did not hold together. Officials initially called it a road accident, then suggested a robbery or a “crime of passion.” In March 2016, the Ministry of the Interior claimed a five-person criminal gang had kidnapped and killed him. Phone records placed the alleged gang members far from the scene, and all five were later reported killed in a police shootout.⁵

During a September 2016 visit to Rome, Egyptian prosecutors admitted for the first time that Regeni had been under police surveillance before his disappearance.² In December 2020, Egypt’s public prosecution formally closed its own investigation, calling the Italian findings “wrong conclusions,” maintaining the killer remained “unknown,” and suggesting “enemy parties” had committed the murder to damage Italian-Egyptian relations. Officials also accused Regeni’s parents of removing his laptop before investigators could examine it and described his research and travel as “suspicious.”⁶

The Four Egyptian Officers Charged

Rome’s prosecutor’s office opened its own investigation in March 2016 at the request of Italy’s Minister of Justice. By December 2020, Italian prosecutors concluded that Egypt’s National Security Agency was directly responsible and formally charged four officials:⁷

General Tariq Sabir, former head of state security, charged with aggravated kidnapping.
Colonel Athar Kamel Mohamed Ibrahim, former head of investigations in Cairo, charged with aggravated kidnapping.
Colonel Uhsam Helmi, a police officer, charged with aggravated kidnapping.
Major Magdi Ibrahim Abdelal Sharif, a General Intelligence officer, charged with aggravated kidnapping and additionally with conspiring to inflict aggravated injuries and murder. Prosecutors allege Sharif ordered informants to surveil Regeni and that Regeni was arrested at a Cairo metro station and tortured for days.⁸

An Italian parliamentary committee endorsed the prosecutors’ conclusions in December 2021, stating that responsibility “rests directly on the security apparatus of the Arab Republic of Egypt, and in particular on officials of the National Security Agency.”⁹

How the Trial Reached a Rome Courtroom

Getting the defendants into an Italian courtroom was blocked from the start. Italy and Egypt have no extradition treaty, and Cairo refused to disclose the suspects’ whereabouts or help notify them of the charges.⁷ The trial opened in October 2021 but was immediately suspended by a judge who questioned whether proceedings could continue when it was unclear if the accused even knew they had been charged.¹⁰

Italy’s Constitutional Court broke the deadlock. On October 26, 2023, in Ruling No. 192, the Court declared part of Article 420-bis of the Italian Criminal Procedure Code unconstitutional as applied. The provision had blocked trials in absentia when defendants could not be notified, but the Court found that applying it here, where the defendants’ own government was refusing to cooperate, would grant them “de facto immunity” for torture, contrary to Italy’s constitutional obligations and the UN Convention Against Torture.¹¹ To protect fair-trial rights, the Court preserved the defendants’ ability to request a new trial if they ever appear.¹²

The trial formally reopened in Rome on February 20, 2024, with all four defendants tried in absentia.¹⁰ Defense attorneys said the accused were “absolutely untraceable” and that any conviction would likely go unenforced.⁴

What Witnesses Have Said in Court

In November 2024, a video from an Al Jazeera documentary was screened in the Rome courtroom showing testimony from a Palestinian man who said he had been detained in the same Egyptian facility as Regeni. He described seeing Regeni “blindfolded and handcuffed” and “exhausted by torture,” carried on his jailers’ shoulders, and subjected to electric shocks.¹³

Regeni’s former roommate in Cairo, identified in court as the “Beta witness,” testified under protected conditions. She said an alleged Egyptian intelligence agent visited their home around December 15, 2015, asking for a copy of Regeni’s passport. Investigators produced phone records showing contact between that agent and the roommate on January 26, 2016, the day after Regeni vanished from a Cairo subway station.¹³

Where the Case Stands in 2026

On January 30, 2026, Italy’s Constitutional Court ruled that the Italian state must advance the payment of legal defense costs for the Egyptian suspects, clearing another obstacle to the proceedings.¹⁴ The trial remains ongoing in Rome. Because the defendants are being tried in absentia and Egypt has not cooperated in locating them, any conviction would likely go unenforced unless a defendant later appears in Italian jurisdiction.⁴

The Diplomatic and Arms-Sale Backdrop

The case opened a serious rift between Rome and Cairo. Italy recalled its ambassador from Egypt in April 2016 as the two countries’ prosecutors reached opposing conclusions.⁸ Italy returned its ambassador in September 2017, a move analysts described as prioritizing “economic and security cooperation over support for human rights and the rule of law.”¹⁵ Egypt is Italy’s main trading partner in North Africa, and the state-controlled energy company Eni is Egypt’s largest Italian investor.¹⁶

The clearest strain between accountability and commerce came through arms deals. In 2017, Italy’s lower house voted to suspend relations with Egypt until a proper investigation and trial took place, but the government of Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte proceeded with weapons sales. In June 2020, Italy approved the sale of two Fincantieri frigates worth roughly $1.2 billion, part of a broader potential package reported at €9 billion to €10 billion covering additional frigates, Eurofighter Typhoon jets, trainer aircraft, and a military satellite.¹⁷ By 2020, new authorizations for military exports to Egypt totaled nearly €4 billion, making Egypt Italy’s top weapons customer for two consecutive years.¹⁸

The Family’s Campaign

Giulio’s parents, Paola Deffendi and Claudio Regeni, have spent years pressing for accountability. In June 2016, they addressed a human rights subcommittee in Brussels and called on the European Union to impose sanctions on Egypt. “Do friends kill each other’s children?” Paola Regeni asked.¹⁹

After the 2020 frigate deal, Paola Deffendi said publicly: “The Italian state has betrayed us. We were betrayed by friendly fire, not by Egypt.”¹⁷ Human Rights Watch has called the Rome prosecution “a rare opportunity to break the cycle of impunity” for Egypt’s security services.⁷

1
University of Cambridge. Statements From the University of Cambridge About the Death of Giulio Regeni
2
The Guardian. Egypt Murder of Giulio Regeni
3
AllAfrica. Egypt Prosecution General Confirms Union Head Reported Regeni
4
The Guardian. Trial Opens in Rome of Four Egyptians Accused Over Giulio Regeni Killing
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BBC. Giulio Regeni Case
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The Guardian. Egypt Drops Inquiry Into Italian Student Giulio Regeni
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Human Rights Watch. Italy Charges Egyptian Security Forces for Giulio Regeni’s Murder
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BBC. Giulio Regeni Trial Opens in Rome
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Al Jazeera. Italy Accuses Egyptian Security of Giulio Regeni’s Murder
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Al Jazeera. Four Egyptian Officials Back on Trial in Italy Over Death of Giulio Regeni
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University of Padua Human Rights Centre. Regeni Case: The Constitutional Court Rules on Prosecution in the Absence of Defendants for the Crime of Torture
12
White Rose Research. Parisi and Pinto on Regeni Constitutional Court Ruling
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Unione Sarda. Witness at Giulio Regeni’s Trial: I Saw Him Blindfolded and Handcuffed, Exhausted by Torture
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ANSA. Regeni Murder Trial Can Resume After Constitutional Court Ruling
15
INSS. European Interest in Egyptian Stability
16
The Guardian. Giulio Regeni Death: Italy, Egypt, Libya
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The Guardian. Family of Giulio Regeni Say They Were Betrayed by Italian PM’s Arms Sale to Egypt
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The New Arab. Egypt Top Importer of Italian Weapons Despite Regeni Case
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BBC. Giulio Regeni Parents Address Brussels