The Iranian Embassy in Rome has made a request to visit Hamid Masoumi-Nejad, a veteran Iranian reporter jailed in Italy on charges of arms trafficking, Press TV reported.
Italy arrested at least seven people on Wednesday, including five Italians and two Iranians, accusing them of smuggling weapons to Iran in violation of an international arms embargo.
One of the targets of Italian police was Hamid Masoumi-Nejad, who had been working as a senior correspondent for the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) in Rome for more than 15 years.
A vocal critic of Berlusconi-led Italian policies, Masoumi-Nejad had received repeated threats from Italian authorities over his hard-hitting coverage of the scandal-ridden Berlusconi government and its increasingly intimate ties with the Israeli regime.
Four days after the reporter's arrest and subsequent imprisonment in the northwestern city of Turin, Iran's ambassador to Italy Mohammad Ali Hosseini made an official request to meet with him.
Hosseini, who was speaking in a Saturday meeting with Masoumi-Nejad's family in Italy, promised to do his utmost to secure the release of Masoumi-Nejad as soon as possible.
The arrests of Masoumi-Nejad and another Iranian national identified as Homayoun Bakhtiyari has drawn sharp criticism from senior members of the Iranian government and the press.
Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said the move was politically-motivated and clearly aimed to create distractions in the international community.
Kazem Jalali, Rapporteur of the Iranian Parliament's Committee on National Security and Foreign Policy, also condemned the detention, saying that it attests to "Italy's blind obedience to Israeli demands."
"Italian officials should explain how they make this arrest without so much as a shred of evidence," Jalili noted on Saturday.
Iranian Parliament (Majles) Speaker Ali Larijani also called the detention as a "childish act" that has further undermined the credibility and reputation of the Italian government in the international community.
Meanwhile, the Association of Iranian Journalists and Reporters has described the arrest of the news correspondent in Italy as 'a Mafia-style tactic' to pressure Iran over its nuclear program.
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