Giulio Regeni murder: Student 'stopped by security officers' on night he disappeared in Egypt, say Italian police

Egyptian authorities deny being involved in the torture of Mr Regeni

People gather during a candle light procession to honor the memory of Giulio Regeni in Fiumicello, Italy, (AP Photo/Paolo Giovannini)

Italian police say they have a credible witness who saw Giulio Regeni, the Cambridge student found murdered in Egypt, being stopped by plain-clothes security officers not far from his home in Cairo on the evening he disappeared.

Egyptian authorities have denied any involvement in the abduction and torture of Mr Regeni, 28, whose body was found dumped by the side of a road on the outskirts of Cairo on 3 February, nine days after he went missing. Italian media and critics of the regime of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi have blamed Egyptian security services or a pro-government death squad for the murder.

It has emerged that investigators from Rome have spoken to someone who gave them what Italian newspapers reported as “concrete details” of the postgraduate student being stopped outside the Bohooth metro stop, just minutes from his flat, on 25 January. Mr Regeni had apparently been on his way to visit Hassamein Kashek, considered a leading anti-Sisi intellectual.

Giulio Regeni

Meanwhile it emerged that the young Italian noticed that he was being photographed by an unknown observer at a political dissidents’ meeting he attended on 11 December. There have also been reports that the Cairo police officer in charge of the murder investigation was previously convicted of involvement in the torture and murder of a detainee.