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Another night of anguish for Nessy Guerra and her little girl, stuck in Cairo for over two years due to an accusation of adultery presented by her Italian-Egyptian ex-husband. But a solution to his long and complex story could now be closer.
After a few hours spent in a police barracks, the embassy in Cairo formalized a request for mercy addressed to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi, and Foreign Minister Tajani, who followed the case step by step with the government, announced that he had received “assurances” of the Cairo government’s willingness “to collaborate to reach a rapid and positive solution to the matter”.
The young woman, considered a fugitive after a six-month prison sentence for adultery issued by an Egyptian court, was taken around 4.30 in the morning from the secret annex where she was and accompanied to a police barracks in Cairo together with her three-and-a-half-year-old daughter Aisha and her parents, who are in Cairo because Nessy’s mother, Fiorella Mazza, is the child’s custodian based on a ruling by the Egyptian judge in December 2024. At least until next custody hearing scheduled for August 6th.
According to what has been learned, everything was born from a request from the girl’s father, released on bail a few days ago from Hurghada prison where he was held for threatening the vice-consul, to see his daughter. However, the police did not show any executive order or ruling to explain the reason for the summons. So much so that the woman’s lawyer, Agata Armanetti, feared that it was a ploy to arrest her. Fear then returned when the Italian ambassador to Cairo Agostino Palese and the consul Giulia De Nardis rushed to the barracks, as soon as they were informed, accompanied by a trusted lawyer. Thanks to their intervention, supported by Minister Tajani from Rome who also spoke to his Egyptian colleague, the young woman was released after a few hours together with the little girl.
However, the episode created confusion in the world of politics, particularly among opposition deputies, with Tajani pressed on the matter in the afternoon during question time in the Chamber. “As soon as I heard the news” of Nessy Guerra’s detention in Egypt – said the minister -, “I was in contact with the Egyptian Foreign Minister Abdelatty, intervening to urge the release of my compatriot.
On this occasion, I wanted to forcefully reiterate, once again, the request for full collaboration on the Egyptian side to guarantee the absolute protection and safety of Mrs. Guerra and her daughter, receiving assurances of her government’s willingness to collaborate to reach a rapid and positive solution to the matter”, added the minister, recalling, amidst applause from the Chamber, that the woman and her daughter had in the meantime returned home. A complicated story, that of the young woman from Sanremo who ended up in the trap of a legislation that is difficult to understand for the legal systems Westerners following her marriage to Tamer Hamouda, therefore also an Italian citizen, who entered prison several times due to episodes of violence and aggression.
Nessy hopes to be able to return to Italy with her daughter and to one day forget the nightmare in which she was entangled. And it is precisely on the custody of the little girl that the most difficult game now seems to be played and unfortunately one with an unpredictable outcome. The government and the Egyptian press are silent on the matter, which has several precedents in Egypt but which for the first time involves an Italian citizen.
In 2018, for example, an Egyptian court granted custody of her children to a foreign mother after a long legal battle with her Egyptian ex-husband. The judges rejected the latter’s accusations and ruled that the mother could maintain custody, albeit under certain conditions, including a travel ban and a ban on remarriage, severe conditions that can also lead to second thoughts after the sentence. A danger that the acceptance of grace could finally avert.