Tag: bloggers

Updates on the detainees: Interior Minister decrees detention orders against Ghazl el-Mahalla labor activists

Posted on 22/04/200805/02/2021 By 3arabawy

I spoke with a Socialist source and a human rights lawyer in Cairo. The two confirmed that the following have been issued a detention decree by General Habib el-Adly, Mubarak’s Interior Minister, and were transferred from Mahalla’s local State Security bureau to Bourg el-Arab Prison in Alexandria:

Kamal Muhammad el-Sayyed el-Fayoumi, Ghazl el-Mahalla worker
Tarek Abdel Hamid Amin (Tarek el-Senoussi), Ghazl el-Mahalla worker
Abdel Kareem Ali el-Beheiri Abdel Kareem (Kareem el-Beheiri), Ghazl el-Mahalla worker and blogger
Ibrahim el-Zoghby, Mahalla resident
Ahmad Muhammad Ahmad, Security guard at Ghazl el-Mahalla
Ibrahim el-Yamani, doctor
Abdel Halim Ahmad, Ghazl el-Mahalla worker

Prosecutor had ordered earlier on Wednesday the release of the above mentioned Mahallans, but Mubarak’s State Security pigs kept them in custody, till the detention decrees were issued…

I spoke with Muhammad el-Sharqawi also today. He’s still recovering from the effects of the four day hunger strike he had staged demanding his release from illegal detention. Sharqawi said he expected the prosecutor to push for a trial in the case of Magdi el-Shafie’s “Metro”, saying it’s State Security’s way of getting back at him for his activism. Metro has been confiscated from Sharqawi’s publishing house, as well as bookstores, with financial losses incurred on Sharqawi.

Free Kareem.. Free Kamal.. Free Mahalla..

Posted on 22/04/200805/02/2021 By 3arabawy

This was among the first set of photos I snapped of Kareem el-Beheiri, the currently “disappeared” Ghazl el-Mahalla activist. It was a Workers’ Coordination Committee meeting in downtown Cairo, which took place on a Friday, one day after the victory of the Kafr el-Dawar textile strike. I recall I was totally exhausted that Friday, after my return on the previous night from Kafr el-Dawar and then stayed up late till I posted a report. I wanted to go home early on that day, but I had already volunteered to translate for three Swedish journalists who showed up at the event. Also I wanted to hear any of the participants in Ghazl el-Mahalla December 2006 strike. And it was Kareem that day who spoke very eloquently about the strike and the future of the struggle against the state-backed labor unions.

The photo below, which unfortunately not that focused and in low resolution, is the first I snapped of Kamal el-Fayoumi, the currently “disappeared” Textile Workers’ League activist. It was January 2007, and Kamal was among a delegation of the Ghazl el-Mahalla December 2006 strike leaders who descended on Cairo to meet with the (state-backed) General Union of Textile Workers officials in Shobra demanding the impeachment of the corrupt local union members who opposed the strike. He was the most fiery among the strike leaders, I recall. In response to Said el-Gohary scoffing the workers’ demands saying they had no right to ask for any since Ghazl el-Mahalla was losing and not generating profits anymore, Kamal stood up and with a high-pitched voice he thundered, while waiving his hands and pointing at the corrupt union officials, “I’m a worker! You give me a production plan every year, and I implement it. It’s not my business what I produced later gets marketed or not! This is the management’s responsibility not mine!” I remember I told myself, “Wow! This guy destroyed the neoliberal logic in four sentences, and I bet he never read either Chomsky or Klein.”

I hope to see Kareem, Kamal, all the political detainees free soon. My heart and thoughts go out to them and their families.

Updates on the detainees: Sharqawi released; Mahalla labor activists ‘disappear’

Posted on 21/04/200805/02/2021 By 3arabawy

Blogger Muhammad el-Sharqawi has been released around noon today.

I couldn’t get thru to him or his fiancé Naira, but I spoke with Amr Gharbeia and Malek Moustafa few mins ago, and they both confirmed it. According to them, Sharqawi was not abused in custody this time, but his health is in a poor state since he had been on a hunger strike since Thursday. He spent the night in Qasr el-Nil Police Station and was then taken to the Qasr el-Nil Prosecutor’s Office, where he was interrogated on charges related to Magdi el-Shafie’s “Metro”. Sharqawi was allowed to go home sometime around noon, but the interrogation is not over yet, and it seems the (Mubarak’s book-burning) govt wanna push for a trial in court.

More worryingly is the news about the Mahalla detainees… The confirmed names of those who “disappeared” in State Security custody in Mahalla, according to Socialist sources in Cairo, are: Ghazl el-Mahalla labor activists Kamal el-Fayoumi, blogger Kareem el-Beheiri, Tarek Amin el-Senoussi and Abdel Halim Ahmad as well as others from outside the company: Mostafa Elzoghby Ibrahim, Ibrahim Abdallah, Mahmoud Ahmad. There are unconfirmed reports these detainees, whose release had been ordered earlier by the Prosecutor, are now transferred to Bourg el-Arab Prison (Alexandria). But no one could confirm this from the Socialist and legal sources in Cairo I phoned. If this is true, then this means the Interior Ministry has issued them detention decrees.

I received this message from a Turkish activist who saw Kareem el-Beheiri ten mins before his arrest on the 7th of April:

I am Cigdem Cidamlı from Turkey and I was in Mahalla on 6th April as a representative of Turkish workers movement and Hayat TV together with … and Kareem. Actually Kareem was arrested just 10 minutes after we left the hotel we stayed together at late evening. We had to return back to Turkey on 7th and after our program about Mahalla on Hayat TV various solidarity actions and statements are issued by Turkish labor circles. Below is the statement of Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions of Turkey (80 thousand membership) about Mahalla workers.
In solidarity,
Cigdem Cidamli
Stop The Repression of the Egyptian Workers Movement
In response to a call for a strike on April 6th by the workers in the Mahalla textile complex, the biggest factory in Egypt, the Mubarek regime decided to occupy El Mahalla complex with security forces, abduct strike committee leaders Kamal El Faioumy and Tarek Amin and arrest political
activists of every political tendency in Cairo and other cities. Not able to suppress the protests, the Mubarak security forces used rubber bullets, tear gas and live ammunition against the Mahalla people who decided to protest on the streets of the city and in different villages, leaving at least two dead and hundreds injured and around 800 arrested.
We send our solidarity to the Egyptian workers and their supporters. We call on the Egyptian dictatorship to release the 800 detained yesterday including more than 150 political activists (socialist, liberals and Islamists), more than 600 protesters from Mahalla (mainly women and children) and Mahalla strike committee leaders.
Tayfun GORGUN
GENERAL SECRETARY OF DISK

~~I received also photos of the solidarity protest that took place in front of the Egyptian Embassy in Paris… Click below…~~