The Nobel Peace Prize laureate and human rights activist Tawakkol Karman has called on the Italian authorities to immediately release the prominent Egyptian opposition leader Mohammed Mahsoub. 

“The arrest of the former Egyptian Minister and Dr. Mohamed Mahsoub by the Italian authorities as a prelude to handing him over to Egypt’s coup authority is a crime that a responsible authority never commits,” wrote Karman in a statement on Facebook. 

She noted that Mahsoub is not a terrorist, and Italy should not engage in suspicious deals with authoritarian regimes, as it is not appropriate for Italy to do so.

“Italian police has been holding me for three hours near the city of Comiso at the request of the Egyptian authorities to extradite me, and they refused to disclose any charges against me,” tweeted Mohammed Mahsoub.

Mahsoub was Egypt's minister of state for parliamentary affairs from August to December 2012, representing Al Wasat Party.