Irene Regeni, the sister of the Cambridge Ph.D. student Giulio tortured and killed in Egypt while he was doing his research, protested last week in front of the prestigious Girton College of Cambridge calling on a stance from the Institute.
Giulio was found dead in Egypt on the 3rd of February, 2016, with his body tormented, after a week without information of him. The identity of the killers is still unknown.
The doubts on the investigation
He was in Cairo on behalf of the University doing a study on a thorny subject: Egyptian independent trade unions, a matter problematic for the government of the President Abd Al-Fattah Al-Sisi.
A link between the subject of the research and his death is hypothesised because it seems that a specialised commando (not common criminals) tortured and killed him.
Also, the Egyptian investigations into the death are supposed to be defective: The Italian prosecutors couldn't question a lot of witnesses, they weren't able to access phone records and the videos from the cameras located in the zone where Giulio disappeared. The Egyptian investigators refused to give them to Italian authorities, saying it would be a violation of the constitution.
The role of Noura Wahbi
Analysing the calls available, the role of the Egyptian friend of Giulio (and colleague in Cambridge), Noura Wahbi, is not very clear.
According to the Italian weekly publication "L'Espresso", she helped him to find a house but she called a person a few times who spoke with the intelligence. In fact, after some red herrings, it was discovered that secret services followed Giulio for some days before his disappearance.
Apparently, they thought he was related to MI6.
The conjecture is false. Giulio was there working for a British University, so the United Kingdom could play an important part by asking for more openness. On the 20th of September, 2016, the British ambassador in Italy announced that the government of Theresa May would do everything is possible to help the authorities.
Claim for transparency
At the moment there is not enough transparency. In the United Kingdom, the transparency of intelligence is a pressing issue: the British secret services could be forced to disclose their activities as they are facing legal action in a case taken by the groups "Reprieve" and "Privacy International". A year ago the EU Parliament, said it was closely watching Egypt’s work on the case.
