Cairo: 26 November 2019
The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) released today a report on the expansion in detaining and imprisoning journalists, lawyers, human rights defenders, academics and secularists on the pretext of belonging to or financing a terrorist group, in spite of their leftist, national, secular or liberal backgrounds and affiliations, and without identifying the nature of such terrorist organizations. This indicates that the real purpose is to silence or punish them by sending them to jail over unsubstantiated and flimsy charges.
The report- entitled “We know that there aren’t any.. but you tell us: What leftist, nationalist, liberal or secular terrorist organizations are there for which innocent people are being imprisoned?!
“– provides 10 examples of cases where defendants were sent to prison despite their leftist, secular and liberal backgrounds and despite the extreme disagreement some of them have towards political Islam.
Although the Egyptian authorities always declare that violent terrorist groups are only affiliated to the extremist Islamic currents or streams, they provide these clear examples of defendants who don’t have any link whatsoever with the Islamic stream. State Security Prosecution always press against defendants with secular backgrounds charges of joining a terrorist group, without disclosing the group’s name, ideas, practices or even the reasons why it is designated as a terrorist group. We need a clear answer to our question, so that we can be able to provide legal defense to the suspects, instead of holding them in detention over illogical charge that is based only on investigations sent by the National Security Agency, which is known for its hostility to freedoms and its violation of the rule of law.
The report also includes names of public figures and journalists, who have become prisoners of conscience over such unsubstantiated charges despite being known for their secular affiliations. Examples of them are: former parliamentarian Ziyad al-Alimi, liberal academic Hazem Hosni, leftist journalist Hisham Fouad, leftist lawyer Haytham Mohammadein, human rights activists Amr Imam and Mohamed al-Baqir, liberal journalist Esraa Abdel Fattah, Nasserist leader Hossam Moanis, and others, whose affiliation to a terrorist group would be something unbelievable, unless there are nationalist, leftist, liberal and secular terrorist groups, other than the Islamic extremist terrorist ones.
To read the report:
for pdf
for word
