Iran has confirmed the arrest of Italian journalist Cecilia Sala. This was reported by the Tehran media. “Cecilia Sala, an Italian citizen, traveled to Iran on 13 December 2024 on a journalist visa and was arrested on 19 December 2024 for violating the law of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” the official IRNA news agency said , citing a statement from the culture ministry without providing further details.
Meanwhile, the defender of Mohamed Abedini Najafabadi, the Iranian arrested in Milan has presented a petition to the Court of Appeal requesting house arrest. AGI learned this from the lawyer Alfredo De Francesco.
“From the analysis of the documents in my possession, although the accusations made are formally serious, in reality the position of my client appears to be much less serious than it may seem” the lawyer had declared in recent days after the arrest of his client on December 16th at Malpensa airport. Abedini is accused by prosecutors in federal court in Boston of conspiracy to export electronic components from the United States to Iran in violation of US export control and sanctions laws and of having provided material support to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, deemed by the US to be a terrorist organization, which subsequently led to the death of three US soldiers, killed in an attack with a drone on a base in Jordan. Within 48 hours the Milan Court of Appeal will have to schedule a hearing in which to discuss the request. Among the hypotheses that have circulated in recent days is also that the arrest of the Italian journalist in Iran is somehow linked to the arrest of the Iranian in Italy.