The Italian government was told of slain Cambridge PhD student Giulio Regeni's disappearance "from the first hours" after he vanished in Cairo in January, 2016, the foreign ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.
"Italian government institutions and our security services were informed from the first hours following the disappearance of Giulio on January 25, 2016," said the statement.
The foreign ministry issued the statement after former prime minister Matteo Renzi told a parliamentary commission of inquiry into Regeni's unsolved murder that the government only learned of his disappearance on 31 January 2016.
"Had we known earlier, we could have acted sooner," Renzi told the commission in his testimony - a claim called into question by the foreign ministry.
"It should also be recalled that all the steps taken with the highest Egyptian authorities were extensively documented and made known to the relevant institutions in Rome by Italy's ambassador (Maurizio) Massari," the foreign ministry statement said.
Rome prosecutors said in July they were probing a further five Egyptian intelligence officers as well as five others who were initially placed under investigation in the case.
Regeni's parents have urged the government to recall Italy's current envoy over Egypt's failure to cooperate in solving the case and bringing Regeni's killers to justice.
Regeni's battered body was found along the Cairo-Alexandria highway in early February, nine days after he vanished from a metro station in central Cairo. The 28-year-old had been tortured to death.
At the time of his disappearance, Regeni had been researching the politically sensitive topic of independent trade unions in Egypt.
