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In a recent turn of events, Italy has chosen to cancel the arrest of an Iranian engineer, who the US has accused of illegally exporting advanced tech. This surprising decision comes shortly after an Italian journalist was released from Iran’s infamous Evin prison.
Mohammed Abedini, a 38-year-old Iranian businessman, faced US charges back in December. His company, based in Switzerland, allegedly supplied navigation systems for Iranian military drones involved in a deadly attack in Jordan that resulted in the deaths of three US service members and injuries to 40 others.
Abedini was apprehended at Milan’s Malpensa Airport last December and jailed pending extradition. However, Italy’s justice minister, Carlo Nordio, asked the Milan Court of Appeal to annul his arrest, pointing to specific extradition treaty technicalities between Italy and the US, as per a statement from his ministry on Sunday.
Italian law mandates that the court follow Nordio’s directive, a ministry representative confirmed to the Financial Times.
Esmail Baghaei, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson, stated that Abedini, who has consistently refuted any allegations through his Italian lawyer, was “released and on his way back home.” Reports from Iranian media affirm he has landed in Tehran.
Baghaei expressed gratitude towards all those who contributed to Abedini’s release, emphasizing the Iranian foreign ministry’s dedication to safeguarding the rights of Iranians abroad.
Rome’s decision to release the engineer follows a diplomatic visit by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni to Mar-a-Lago, where she met with US president-elect Donald Trump. They discussed the situation of Cecilia Sala, a young Italian journalist arrested in Tehran shortly after Abedini. The timing of Sala’s arrest led to suspicions in Italy that it was an attempt by Tehran to exert pressure on Rome regarding Abedini’s case.
Meloni’s administration faced mounting pressure domestically to ensure Sala’s release. Her eventual return to Italy was met with nationwide jubilation and praise for the government’s efforts.
“It was a complex diplomatic maneuver involving Iran and the US,” Meloni remarked to the media after Sala’s return.
Although officially, no link has been acknowledged between the cases of Sala and Abedini, Nathalie Tocci, director of Rome’s Institute of International Affairs, believed that Abedini’s release became certain once Sala was freed. Tocci suggested that Meloni may have received Trump’s approval for the exchange, asserting, “Italy proceeded because it had Trump’s go-ahead.”
Nordio’s court application highlighted that the US-Italy extradition treaty requires crimes to be punishable by both nations’ laws—a condition Nordio insisted was not met based on available documents.
The petition pointed out that US authorities were seeking to prosecute Abedini under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act—a US law that doesn’t align with Italian criminal law.
Alfredo De Francesco, Abedini’s lawyer, expressed satisfaction with the decision to lift the pre-trial detention. He underscored that the ruling aligned with his longstanding arguments about insufficient grounds for extradition and upheld the essential principle of personal freedom.
Last month, US prosecutors alleged that Abedini collaborated with Mahdi Mohammad Sadegh, a dual US-Iranian citizen and employee at a Massachusetts microelectronics firm, to bypass export controls. They accused them of sending US-origin tech to Iran for military applications. Sadegh was apprehended in the US.
Bita Ghaffari contributed additional reporting.
