Six more detainees from Victorious Sect–the group Mubarak’s State Security Police had fabricated in 2006–were released two days ago.
Their names are: Muhammad Salah Ibrahim, Nabil Muhammad Muhammad, Ahmad Mustafa Saber “Shobeir,” Tamer Abdel Nabi, Abdel Aziz Fouad and Muhammad Abdallah Bakri.
Tomorrow morning, a report I co-researched for Human Rights Watch, titled “Anatomy of a State Security Case: The “Victorious Sect” Arrests” will finally be launched online. The report investigates how Mubarak’s State Security Police fabricates terror cases, taking the “Victorious Sect” round-ups in the spring of 2006 as a case study.
I had the pleasure of working with HRW’s senior investigative lawyer John Sifton, of the Terrorism/Counterterrorism Program, this summer on the report in the months before I took off to Berkeley. Some additional research had to be done while I was in the US, and then the report was further delayed to confirm more details and update some sections. I’m glad it’s finally out.
The report will also be available in Arabic.
Does anybody remember the “Victorious Group?” That first of its kind “Salafi Takfiri” group in Egypt a la Zarqawi style, as the state-owned press and self-described counter-terrorism pundits told us?
These were 22 young Egyptians, picked up last April. The security then proudly stated that “Information, documents and interviews … confirmed that they were studying carrying out terrorist operations against tourist targets, the gas pipeline on the Greater Cairo ring road and some sensitive sites through bombings,… They were also studying targeting some Muslim and Christian religious figures and … what they called degenerate youth in tourist areas.”
The arrest of that “group” was announced–surprise, surprise–11 days before the extension of the emergency law.
Some pro-democracy activists, who were detained last spring for their solidarity with the Egyptian judiciary’s fight for independence said they met “Victorious Group” guys during visits to the State Security prosecutor. One of them, leftist blogger Alaa Seif, wrote the VG suspects appeared to have received brutal tortured by State Security agents, to extract confessions.
Well, guess what? The State Security Prosecutor has just dismissed the case saying the evidence is bogus, and ordered the release of the 22 men.