Body of Italian student found in Cairo flown back to Italy

Mourners leave 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. AP

CAIRO, Egypt—The body of the Italian student who was found this week in a Cairo suburb was flown back to Italy Saturday morning, Egyptian airport officials and Italy’s foreign minister said.

Paolo Gentiloni told reporters in Amsterdam that the body of 28-year-old Giulio Regeni was being transported to Rome and eventually to the Italian city of Trieste.

Italy’s ANSA news agency reported that Italian prosecutors have ordered an autopsy as part of the investigation into Regeni’s death.

Egyptian authorities have already conducted an autopsy and prosecutors investigating the case said they are waiting for a full report.

The circumstances surrounding Regeni’s death remain murky. He disappeared on Jan. 25, the anniversary of Egypt’s 2011 uprising, a day when security forces were on high alert and out on the streets in force to prevent any demonstrations or protests.

He was found Wednesday with multiple stab wounds, cigarette burns and other signs of torture on a roadside on the outskirts of Cairo, Egyptian officials said.

Gentiloni said he was told that Italian investigators “are beginning to work with the Egyptian authorities,” but there were signs of confusion as to the status of the investigation.

Gentiloni said that preliminary arrests have been made, without elaborating, but the deputy head of criminal investigations in Cairo’s twin province of Giza, Alaa Azmi, denied Saturday that anyone had been arrested in connection with the case.

An Egyptian Interior Ministry official also maintained on Saturday that no arrests had been made. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.