Articles for Egypt

Cairo, Geneva - 29 December 2011 - Today, the offices of 6 local and international NGOs in Egypt were raided by teams of investigators and prosecutors accompanied by uniformed military and security forces. Warrants have been issued to search and investigate a total of 17 organizations under the accusations of “receiving funding from foreign countries” and other crimes according to the heavily criticised 2002 “NGO law”.

The organizations visited today are:

Following the "million-man march" held last Friday, 18 November 2011, Egyptian Central Security Forces used massive amounts of tear gas and live ammunition against peaceful protesters in an attempt to suppress the demonstrations.

Alkarama, based in Geneva, and the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) in Cairo, had previously lodged a complaint with the WGAD regarding the case of Mr Sanad, asking for their immediate intervention to bring an end to his military trial.

On 23 October 2011, the Supreme State Security Prosecution referred 76 defendants, who were arrested in the events outside the Saudi Embassy, to the Supreme State Security Emergency Court.

‏The prosecution did not disclose any information about the killing of peaceful demonstrators by the Central Security Forces and Military Police so far.

Mr Abou Al Maaty AL SAYED was directly taken to the Farag Police Station, where he was subjected to various acts of torture at the hands of two agents of the Criminal Investigation branch, Ali Maher and Saïd Chaarwy, who forced him to undress and shaved his hair, eyebrows and moustache.

Mr. Mohammad Mahmud Salih Al Aswani (aged 60) is one of the oldest political prisoners in Egypt. He has been detained for close to 31 years and he remains behind bars in the high security prison of Lyman Tura.

Alkarama has learned that the Egyptian authorities released Mr. Nabil El-Maghribi on June 2011.

On 15 May thousands of Egyptian youth and political activists, on the anniversary of the Nakba and the so-called Third Intifada Day, went to protest peacefully in front of the Israeli embassy, mainly by shouting out calls for Palestinians' due rights.