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An Egyptian court on Tuesday sentenced rights researcher Patrick Zaki to three years in prison for "spreading false news", a rights activist said, even as the government conducts a dialogue aiming to give the opposition a voice.

Human rights defender Hossam Bahgat, who runs the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights where Zaki worked, said no appeal is possible against the conviction over an article he wrote about religious freedom.

Zaki previously spent 22 months in pre-trial detention until December 2021 and was again taken into custody Tuesday after the court ruling in Mansoura, 130 kilometres (80 miles) north of Cairo.

His 2020 article recounted his experiences of discrimination as a member of the country's Coptic Christian minority, who number around 10-15 percent of Egypt's 105 million people.

The drawn-out case has triggered international condemnation, particularly in Italy where he was studying at Bologna University. He was arrested in 2020, while returning to visit family, under charges of "spreading false news", "harming national security" and "incitement to overthrow the state", among others.

'Scandalous'

Amnesty International, in a statement released Tuesday in Italian, called the ruling "a scandalous verdict".

Rights defenders have said Zaki was beaten and tortured with electricity during his detention.

Thousands in Italy signed petitions calling for Zaki's release, and the country's senate voted in 2021 to grant him Italian citizenship.

Relations between Cairo and Rome had previously been strained by the 2016 killing of Italian PhD candidate Giulio Regeni in Egypt in 2016, which sparked alarm over academic freedom in the country.

Egypt ranks in the lowest group on the Academic Freedom Index, with researchers frequently detained and harassed for their work.

Cairo has come under frequent criticism for its human rights record, with tens of thousands of political prisoners - including journalists, lawyers, trade unionists and artists - behind bars, according to rights groups.

The government launched a "national dialogue" this year, hoping to bring in an opposition that has been decimated by more than a decade of repression since President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi deposed Islamist President Mohamed Morsi after popular protests.

Sisi has positioned himself a champion of religious freedom, regularly attending Christmas mass, appointing the country's first Coptic judge to head the constitutional court and emphasising religious freedom in the country's national human rights strategy.

The latest "Human Rights Bulletin" released by the government this week hailed the legalisation of 216 Christian places of worship.

However, the country's largest minority regularly complains of discrimination, particularly in the barriers to building and renovating churches.