621 Notes on Press Freedom
Egypt has a funny way of celebrating May 3, World Press Freedom Day. Last year it marked the occasion by sentencing Al-Jazeera journalist Huwaida Taha to six months in prison for a documentary she made about torture in Egypt. This year press freedom watchdogs fear it will mark the occasion by upholding 1-year prison sentences condemning editors of four opposition newspapers.
In a related development, blogger and journalist Abd al-Moneim Mahmud, who has himself been detained several times in recent years, reports by SMS that State Security has prevented him from traveling to Morocco to attend a conference on press freedom.
Full IFEX statement on the Eissa/Qandil/Hamuda/Ibrashi case after the break…
More…
619 A 30-Percent Raise
Ful and Tameyya
- Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak proposed a 30-percent raise for public-sector employees in his May Day address today. According to Central Bank figures released last week, the public sector currently accounts for about 30 percent of Egypt’s GDP. The (textile) factory workers I’ve met made an average of about LE 200 ($37) a month.
- The governor of Alexandria has declared the bread crisis “over” there after the construction of 32 new government-subsidized bakeries, each producing 50,000 loaves a day. His proclamation coincided with news of two more subsidized-flour-smuggling rings in Alexandria and Sohag.
It will be interesting to see how much steam this lets out of the May 4 strike. I also wonder how we will know. Friday and Saturday were a weekend. Thursday was supposed to be a holiday, but apparently it got taken away at the last minute? Sunday and Monday were holidays. Tomorrow is a national holiday. And many a lucky so-and-so took the days in between.
Police brutality in Kafr al-Dawwar
Via email, from the Hisham Mubarak Center and the Nadim Center, a harrowing case of police abuse. Here’s an excerpt from their report:
Scene Two:
Same day, 10 a.m.. the police returns with a bigger force.. they surround the house.. five armed
officers and 14 informers go into the flat, find Ahmed Sobhi, beat him up with iron and wooden
bars, strip him naked and drag him as such all the way to the police station, which is about 400
meters away. Throughout he is beaten, witnessed by his father, mother, wife, children and
neighbors. Some of the informers stay behind, push the father in a corner of his flat and burn his
body with cigarettes.. at the entrance of the building an officer fires seven bullets and orders his
colleagues to collect the empty cassettes.. to his misfortune they miss two.. the family collects
them and takes them to the prosecution.
And the email:
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????? ???? ???? ???? 67 ???? ???? ???? ???? ????? ?? ????? ?????? ???? ?? ???? ??????? ????????? ??????? ????? ?????? ???? ???? ???????.
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A new crime by the Egyptian Ministry of Interior in Kafr el Dawwar
Torture by the police.. Complicity by the prosecution and the hospitalCairo, 29/4/2008, 7 p.m.
Upon an appeal by Ms. Mona Sobhi a delegation from Hisham Mubarak Law Center and El Nadim Center went to Kafr el Dawwar to visit the family of Sobhi Mohamed Sobhi Hussein and listen to the statements and testimonies of victims to a brutal police attack on a number of family members. The delegation then went to the police station and was able to meet with the victims.
Hadj Sobhi Mohamed Hussein, 67 years old, suffered several cigarette burn marks on his chest and abdomen. He told us of other similar marks on his thighs.
Ahmed Sobhi Mohamed Hussein, 36 years old, suffers hemorrhage in the left eye with consequent no perception of light. Bruises and abrasions were observed on his face and arms and various parts of his body.
Mohamed Sobhi Hussein, 38 years old, fracture of right wrist bones.
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