Abedini’s arrest: Tehran retaliates by detaining an Italian journalist

On December 19th, 2024, the 29-year-old Italian journalist Cecilia Sala was apprehended from her hotel in Teheran by Iranian agents and placed under arrest. She is currently detained in an isolation cell of the infamous Evin prison, where she has been held for a week. However, the news of her arrest only emerged on December 27^th on the Italian media.

As reported by Il Giornale, Sala did not commit any crime; she left Rome for Iran on December 12^th, with a regular visa, to conduct a series of interviews and record some episodes for the podcast “Stories” she edits for Chore Media. She was supposed to fly back to Rome on December 20th, but she never made it to the airport. Her phone suddenly went silent, none of her Iranian contacts knew what had happened to her, but the following day the journalist made two very short phone calls, one to her mother and one to her partner, saying that she had been arrested by the Iranian police.

Sala’s detention is very likely a retaliation for the arrest of Iranian citizen and a main asset of the IRGC in Europe, Mohammad Abedini, apprehended on Monday, December 16th, on US request, by the Italian police in Milan’s Malpensa airport after landing on a flight coming from Turkey. Another Iranian with US citizenship and connected to Abedini, Mahdi Mohammad Sadeghi, was almost simultaneously arrested in Massachusetts. (Read ToI’s article on the arrests here).

The Italian investigators are analyzing the material found in Abedini’s luggage, including electronic components compatible with the crimes contested by the US Court of Justice, paper, banking and commercial material, three telephones and computer devices.

As indicated in the December 16th press release of the US DOJ, Sadeghi and Abedini have been charged with conspiring to export sophisticated electronic components from the United States to Iran in violation of US export control and sanctions laws. Abedini is also charged with providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization (FTO), that resulted in the deaths of US military personnel; specifically, the January 28th, 2024, drone strike on the Tower 22 outpost in Jordan, that killed three US soldiers and injured more than 40.

Abedini graduated from Sharif University, nicknamed “the MIT of Iran”, sanctioned by the European Union for its ties with the Iranian government, specifically with the Pasdaran, for the development of ballistic missiles. After graduating in 2019, Abedini moved to Lausanne, Switzerland, to work as a post-doc researcher at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne and founded Illumove SA, a start-up registered at the Innovation Park of that same Swiss school, as a cover for his previously founded Iranian company, SDRA, to circumvent the sanctions and purchase components from the United States.

SDRA’s main business is selling a proprietary navigation system, known as the Sepehr Navigation System, to the IRGC, which the United States designated as an FTO in April 2019. The primary application of SDRA’s Sepehr Navigation System is for use in UAVs, as well as cruise and ballistic missiles.

According to the US-Italy bilateral treaty, the extradition request must be presented within 45 days of the arrest, and it needs to obtain the green light from Milan’s Appeal Court. Abedini was arrested on December 16th, therefore the US authorities have until the end of January 2025 to forward the request. If convicted, both Abedini and Sadeghi could face sentences of up to 20 years in prison.

As explained by the UK-based Persian language news site Iran International, Iran is trying to secure the release of Mohammad Abedini and is unhappy with the measure taken by Italy: “The lack of official notification to the Iranian embassy and the denial of access to Abedini, an Iranian citizen, is a clear example of abduction”.

It’s obvious that there is a clear difference between an arrest made under international law, as in the case of Abedini, and the kidnapping of a journalist to be used as a bargaining chip. Cecilia Sala’s detention is nothing other than an act of terrorism. The Iranian regime’s tactic seems to be aimed at pressuring the Italian authorities regarding Abedini’s arrest and his possible extradition to the United States.

Indeed, a negotiation with the Iranian regime shouldn’t even be contemplated as it is not only ethically wrong, but it would also be disastrous since it would encourage further kidnappings of foreign citizens by Iran and its terrorist proxies. The only response should be to implement strong pressure and tougher measures against an agonizing regime willing to do anything to stay afloat.