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Egyptian President Abdel Fattah
el-Sisi on Wednesday urged Italian investigators to return to
Cairo to continue probing the torture and murder of Italian
researcher Giulio Regeni.
"We told them, come, and we say once more: come, be with
us. We deal with issues with complete transparency," Sisi told
the Egyptian parliament.
"Let the (Italian) investigators join us and take part in
all the efforts that are being made".
Italy broke off judicial cooperation in the case and
recalled its Cairo ambassador after the failure of a two-day
summit last week, to which the Egyptians failed to bring
long-sought phone records.
Italy is weighing fresh moves to pressure Egypt to cooperate
on probing the torture and murder of the 28-year-old Cambridge
doctoral student, who was researching trade unions in Cairo.
Regeni disappeared on January 25, the heavily policed fifth
anniversary of the 2011 uprising that toppled former strongman
Hosni Mubarak, and his mutilated body turned up in a ditch on
the road to Alexandria on February 3.
Egyptian authorities have offered up a series of scenarios
for how the atrocity occurred, ranging from a road accident to a
gay lovers' spat to a kidnapping for ransom gone wrong.
Italy has not found any of these versions credible.
Sisi, however, said the Egyptian authorities were doing
everything possible to get to the truth on Regeni and blamed the
suspicions about the involvement of the security forces on a
form of national masochism.
"As soon as the news of the murder of this young man came
out, there were people among us who said that the security
services did it," Sisi said before an assembly made up of
representatives of 19 political parties, as well as trade union
heads and representatives of human-rights organizations.
"They clearly said that we killed him.
"Many people spoke about it on social networks and many
professionals published the news.
"But those who follow what happens in Egypt and observed
this case with attention said 'it's you saying it, I don't
believe you'.
"Not only is the interior ministry tasked with the case,
so is the general prosecutor and the Egyptian judiciary.
"But they don't believe us anyway. We are doing this to
ourselves".
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