Articles for Egypt

A number of United Nations experts in the field of human rights(*) said that Egypt uses special judicial services involved in terrorism cases to target human rights defenders, silence dissidents and detain activists despite the Covid-19 pandemic.  

United Nations independent human rights panel warned of "serious and unnecessary" risks faced by human rights defenders arrested in Egypt for prolonged pre-trial detention . Experts said in a press release that the risks are most evident during the Covid-19 pandemic, and called on authorities to facilitate the release of chronically ill prisoners or detainees without an adequate legal basis.

Egyptian authorities confirmed on 13 August 2020 that the political leader and member of the Muslim Brotherhood, Dr. Essam Al-Aryan, had died in his prison cell in the infamous Al-Aqrab prison following a heart attack.
Al-Aryan was arrested at dawn on Wednesday, October 30, 2013, following the military coup carried out by the Egyptian army led by Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, which overthrew the elected president, Mohamed Morsi.

Independent UN experts (*) said that "credible evidence” show that inadequate prison conditions in which former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi may have led “directly” to the death of former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi., warning that gross human rights violations in the country are a reality for thousands of detainees across the State, “many of whom may be at risk of death.

On March 28, 2019, Alkarama has submitted its shadow report ahead of Egypt’s upcoming third Universal Periodic Review (UPR) before the UN Human Rights Council that is scheduled in November 2019. The UPR, which is held every four to five years, is a peer-review mechanism during which UN Member States assess each other’s human rights records and make recommendations based on the principles enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

On March 27, 2019, journalist and head of Mada Foundation, Hisham Jaafar, was released upon decision of the Cairo Central Criminal Court, after spending over three and a half years in prison.

On 31 January 2019 Alkarama sent a communication to the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions to call on the Egyptian authorities to publicly release the names of all those killed during the 30 December 2018 operation presented as counter-terrorism by the authorities as a response to the terrorist attack of 29 December 2018 in Giza against a tourist bus.

(Geneva, September 25, 2018) ­– Alkarama has requested the urgent intervention of the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID) following the abduction of 31-year-old Egyptian citizen Magdy Ez Eldin by members of the National Security Forces.

(Geneva, August 23, 2018) – On August, 17, 2018, Mohammed Atta, a 40-year-old Egyptian citizen, was coming back to Egypt with his spouse from Saudi Arabia, where he works as a senior sale consultant. Upon their arrival at the border security control of Cairo airport, officers proceeded to arrest him without providing any explanation. Since then, his family has been inquiring about his fate and whereabouts with the authorities, to no avail.

(Geneva, July 31, 2018) – On July 12, 2018, Alkarama requested the intervention of several UN Special Procedures* in the case of Aliaa Awaad, an Egyptian photojournalist who was arrested on October 23, 2017 for her coverage of terrorist activities, and is currently detained at Al Qanater Prison.