Cecilia Sala, a reporter for the Il Foglio daily newspaper, was detained in Tehran on Dec. 19, six days after she arrived on a journalist's visa.

Cecilia Sala, 29, was arrested on Dec. 19, according to Italy’s foreign ministry, but her arrest was only made public on Friday.

The Italian reporter is being held in solitary confinement within Tehran’s notorious Evin prison, a jail for dissidents and political prisoners. She must be released forthwith. For who knows what lurks in the hearts of the Ayatollah Khamenei and Iran’s Revolutionary Guard?

The Italian government has summoned the Iranian ambassador to protest the detention of Italian journalist Cecilia Sala in Tehran, calling for her immediate release, the Foreign Ministry in Rome said on Thursday.

The summons came a day after a similar move by Italy over Iran's arrest of Italian reporter Cecilia Sala, who was seized in Tehran on Dec. 19 while working under a journalist visa.

The fate of an Italian journalist detained in Tehran and an Iranian engineer imprisoned in Italy on a U.S. warrant grew even more intertwined Friday as the Iranian awaits possible extradition to the United States to face charges he provided drone technology to Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guard corps.

Italy is working to secure the release of journalist Cecilia Sala, who's been detained in Iran since Dec. 19 for allegedly violating its laws.