Judge Abdel Fattah Murad, who’s filing a lawsuit demanding the closure of 21 blogs and website claiming they “defame Egypt’s image, insult the president, and harm national interests,” is now escalating his campaign, filing a new lawsuit against Leftist lawyers Ahmad Seif and Gamal Eid, the directors of the Hisham Mubarak Law Center and HR-Info respectively, as well as blogger Amr Gharbeia. The three are summoned to the North Cairo Prosecutor’s office on Thursday, for interrogation on charges of “blackmail.”
Tag: bloggers
Moneim and MB detainees to start hunger-strike tomorrow
Blogojournalist Abdel Moneim Mahmoud, and the 18 detained MB students are to start an open-ended hunger-strike tomorrow Tuesday, if the Prosecutor extends their detention, after being subject to humiliating treatment in Mahkoum Tora Prison.
In a statement sent out of prison, the detainees complained from:
1-Confinement for 23 hours a day in overcrowded cells where an average of 22 inmates are kept in 10×22 feet cells infested with bugs with only one extremely filthy bathroom to share.
2-Numerous assaults by criminal prisoners and thugs, including sexual harassment and verbal abuse.
3-Use of illegal drugs inside prison cells by criminals and drug dealers, and the produced smoke which makes it very difficult to even breath an already polluted air, in addition to extremely foul language and screaming all night by intoxicated thugs which became a source of psychological agony.
4-Poor medical care in handling life threatening and contagious medical conditions, including skin diseases and HIV. Four cases of chicken pox and measles were denied appropriate care and hospital admission.
The statement also complained that the students who were mostly preparing for their final exams, surrendered their school books to the prison administration in protest, since it became impossible for them to study in such awful environment.
Moneim is to be interrogated by the Prosecutor tomorrow, at the Tagammu el-Khames Prosecution’s Office, Nasr City. Please express your solidarity by showing up tomorrow 10am in front of the office.
If you can’t show up, it’d be still great to at least write one follow up posting on his case, and circulate information among your contacts and friends, inside Egypt and abroad, about the abuses against Moneim and the Egyptian political detainees languishing in Mubarak’s gulag.
Wedding cancelled
I received a text message around 5:45pm, saying Jimmi and Diga’s wedding was cancelled due to the heavy security deployment in Talaat Harb. The one in Sharm is of course underway. I arrived in the square few mins after 6pm, to check the scene out for myself anyways.
And indeed all the expected guests showed up: brigades of Central Security Forces, plainclothes thugs, State Security officers and even firefighters!
[Above: Talaat Harb Sq under occupation by Mubarak’s police.]
When I started taking photos, a young State Security officer in plainclothes crossed the road and ordered me to leave and not take photos of the troops. I told him I was gonna leave, but didn’t move and kept chatting with fellow journalists and photographers who showed up. The officer came back to me again, and told me to instruct the BBC crew not to film. I replied saying he should tell them that himself. He replied rudely saying “I am State Security.” I told him: “Pleased to meet you.”
“Ok, so now go and tell them to leave. Aren’t you working with them?”
“No. I’m a freelance journalist.”
“Ok, go and tell them.”
“Why don’t you do it yourself?” (Of course I know why.. because he’s chicken shit when it comes to foreign Westerners, but only like to flex his muscles on locals.)
“You should be more patriotic,” he charged (I wanted to get my violin out then, and start playing the national anthem.)
Anyways, we were about to leave… so I asked the State Security officer: “So no events planned for today?”
“No, there was no event in the first place.”
“Oh, I heard there was a wedding.”
“No, and if there was one, we won’t let it happen.”
“Why not? People wanna express their joy and share the happiness felt in Sharm.”
“Ok, yalla yalla… There’s nothing today”