Tag: ss

Resources on Egypt’s State Security Police

SS Brigadier Muhammad Mahmoud Borghosh عميد أمن دولة محمد محمود برغش

Posted on By 3arabawy
From SS Officers

Among the sets I found on the Nasr City SS DVDs was one of Brigadier General Muhammad Mahmoud Borghosh.

The officer’s name was mentioned in the infamous case filed by NDP lawyer Samir el-Sheshtawi against Ad-Dustour editor and dissident journalist Ibrahim Eissa. The latter was sentenced to prison over bogus charges, but was “pardoned” by Mubarak in a PR move.

Judge Mahmoud Hamza, one of the reformist Judges who took part the “Judges Intifada” accused Borghosh of taking part in the brutal assault against him on 23 April 2006, as SS and the Central Security Forces moved in to suspend the sit in staged by activists in solidarity with the reformist Judges in downtown Cairo.

Brigadier General Borghosh is no stranger to human rights activists. Lawyer Gamal Eid wrote me:

محمد برغش.. أحد ضباط أمن الدولة سيئ السمعة. كان ضمن المسئولين عن ملف المحامين والقضاء، وبدءا من عام 2003 ، أصبح مسئول ملف القضاء فقط وكان أعلى وسيط امن الدولة في التعامل مع القضاة. وخلال محاكمة أيمن نور كان دوره أهم من عادل عبدالسلام جمعة رجل الحكومة في القضاء. وإذا استطعت الوصول لصور من محاكمات أيمن نور التي حضرتها كمراقب للهيومان رايتس ووتش كان دائما ما يقف على المنصة خلف القضاة الثلاثة فضلا عن دوره في توجيه محاكمة البسطويسي ومكي التي .فبركها النظام السابق

Eid describes Borgosh as

…one of the State Security Police officers with the worst reputations. He was in charge of the lawyers’ and judges’ file… and was the most senior liaison between State Security Police and the Judges. During Ayman Nour’s trial, his [Borghosh’s] role was more important than the pro-government presiding judge, Adel Abdel Salam Goma’a. If you can get hold of any of the photos of Ayman Nour’s trial sessions, which I attended as a monitor for Human Rights Watch, you’ll find him [Borghosh] always standing behind the judges’ bench. Needless to say, he had a role in directing the trial of [Judges Hisham] el-Bastaweesi and Mahmoud Mekki.

Why isn’t Brigadier General Borghosh on trial now? Will he be part of the newly established National Security Sector?

General Tarek Mahmoud el-Rakaybi اللواء طارق محمود الركايبي

Posted on By 3arabawy
From SS Officers

State Security Police General Tarek Mahmoud el-Rakaybi, whose photos I found on the SS DVDs, was one of the senior officials in the agency, before he was promoted in 2009 by General Habib el-Adly, the interior minister, to head the General Police Directorate of Private Guards, which provides bodyguards to govt officials and important business facilities. When the service provided to facilities, the directorate used to impose financial sums of money on the business, though it’s the duty already of the police to protect public security and that includes any facilities. In previous interviews I conducted with retired Brigadier General Mahmoud el-Qutri, he described this directorate as “the goose that lays the golden eggs” for the interior ministry.

El-Rakaybi’s is accused in a financial corruption scandal, where he as well as other SS officers including Hisham Abu Gheida, were receiving illicit sums of money from the ministry of trade and industry that amount to LE147,000 on a bimonthly basis.

Photos of el-Rakaybi were censored by Flickr, but I uploaded them here.

General Ahmad Raafat اللواء أحمد رأفت جلاد الإسلاميين

Posted on By 3arabawy
From SS Officers

The infamous General Ahmad Raafat, who went by the names Mostafa Refaat, Murad, el-Hagg, was in charge of State Security Police “Counter-Islamic Extremism” operations. He was one of the central figures in the 1990s dirty war and engineered the “revisions” by which the Gamaa Ismaliya stopped its operations and renounced violence. He was accused by several detainees of supervising their torture personally. The general died last year of a heart attack in his office.

I found on the SS DVDs a couple of personal profile pictures of him, as well as some pictures from a wedding involving a family member. Among the guests invited were SS senior officials including General Hassan Abdel Rahman, SS director.

From SS Officers

and others like Hisham Abdel Fattah Abu Gheida and Tarek Mahmoud el-Rakaybi seen below.

From SS Officers
From SS Officers

And in the picture below, you can see on the same table the current public prosecutor Abdel Meguid Mahmoud (on the right), together with Hisham Badawi, the High State Security Prosecutor.

From SS Officers

One final note, Abdel Meguid, Mahmoud who was appointed by Mubarak as the public prosecutor, how can we entrust him with the current investigations into corruption and torture? The man was part of the Mubarak’s regime, and a close friend of regime officials. Under his nose, the daily abuses of the regime has been taking place and he never took action. Abdel Meguid Mahmoud must go.