Detaining 14 people from 6th of April Youth Movement in Alexandria

After a successful conference for the 6th of April's Youth Movement at the Ghad Party Alexandria HQ and their meeting with some of Alexandria's youth, those young people went to the beach wearing the movement's t shirts, singing patriotic songs and raising the Egyptian flags. They were also flaying a kite with the Egyptian Flag shape on it.

But then, strangely, State Security officers came and told them to stop singing and taking off their t shirts. This was opposing to National Security according to the officers. The people didn't obey the "order", so "naturally" the State Security forces attacked them physically while spraying them a strange substance (supposedly some sedative substance). Resulting in falling of some of them, so they dragged them on the ground to the SS cars, hitting them heavily several times.The SS took them to a place called ElFara'ena (The Pharaohs) in Alexandria. This place is known to be the HQ of the State Security in Alexandria.

This is a video shot just before the State Security attack happen



Those brave ones are arrested:
Khaled Adel
Mahinor ElMasry (The only girl) Update: She is now out, the rest still.
Youssef Shaa'ban
Bassem Fat'hy
Mustafa Maher
Amro Ali
Nour ElDeen Sob'hy
Medhat Shaker
Moa'tasem Bellah Mohammad
Tarek Tito
Mohammad Mahmoud
Ahmad Nassar
Ahmad Afifi
The State Security ordered that they will be detained for 15 days and this is the text for the reason of their detention

On Thursday, 24th of July
4 pm
In the case of detaining the Internet Activists
The case's number is 5943 for year 2008 Raml First Administration in Alexandria
Accusations:
Crowding
Participating with others to disrupt the means of transport and disrupting traffic
Crowing for more than 5 persons in public places and collecting agents under the name of 6th of April movement via Internet and incitement to overthrow the regime and destabilize the Country
Inciting demonstrations by distributing leaflets within citizens to call for civil disobedience
The order:
Detention for 15 days for investigation

For more pics you can go there



It is observed this time the brutal security dealing with the detainees

Islam Nabih - Postponded.

Other Coverages:

1. Nawara Negm (Arabic, including videos from the trial)
2. Ahmed Abdul Fattah (Arabic)
3. Wael Abbas (Arabic)
4. Takhareefy (Arabic)
5. Sokoot Hansawat (Arabic)
6. Egypt WatchMan (Arabic)

new coverages will follow.

I went to the court to attend the trial of Captain Islam Nabih and Corporal Reda Fat'hi who are accused of torturing and sodomizing driver Emad ElKebeer, I arrived at the High Judicial House at 10:00 am then walked around until the beginning of the trial. Then I found Ahmed Abdel Fattah walking around. On our entrance the security on the door of the hall asked us who we were, we told him journalists and we forgot our IDs. We entered then witnessing two trials of obviously false law-suits (confession under torture). Then came another 2 bloggers, Sokoot Hansawat and Mariam. After them at 11:30 came the infamous Islam with nearly a dozen of black-suited soldiers distributing them in a weird way, seemly to put obstacles in front of the video cameras or something. Also I wanted to record that the security prevented any media existence nearly 10 meters near Islam, to the extent that the security shouted at a photographer to get away.

When the trial started, the team of lawyers defending Islam kept attacking the Human Rights organisations, accusing them with the infamous accusation of defaming Egypt's reputation, and getting foreign funds (as if the government never gets them with huge amounts). They also accusing them with that they do not care about the Human Rights but just use them for the sake of their benefits.

And from what is mentioned that these organisations wanted to prevent Egypt from having a seat in the United Nations Human Rights Council.

And to prevent people from thinking that this team is attacking the idea of promoting Human Rights, they handled in (ironically) a paper signed from some judges (as far as I can remember) and was supposed to be published in the national newspapers, as a call to the Egyptian People's Assembly to issue a law to ban foreign funding, esp from USA. (really Ironic, Egypt is the second country getting aid from USA after Israel, military aid and economic aid. Around 1.5 Billion $ annually. With total of 25 Billion $ from 1975 to 2002)

Then came some non-sense, that the Fagr weekly newspaper which mentioned news about the torture incident, was published 2 days before its supposed date, and according to this they claimed that the news was fabricated (I really don't know what is the connection).

Some other non-sense, one of the team stated that they don't watch TV thanks for being so busy with their work as a lawyer, but for the mere chance he was so ill so he opened the TV watching Orbit, in the Qahera AlYoum show (Cairo Today) and he found out that he was accused in assaulting 2 families (which was done with preparation with defence lawyers team, since in the statements of the arrested and the witnesses in the Police interrogations Emad was not there).

Wael Abbas was mentioned as a Human Rights organisation (now this is amusing), mentioning that he made a call in his blog to the United Nations for an international investigation for late Sadat assassination, sometimes I really hate lawyers.

Then came the responsible for defending Corporal Reda Fat'hi obeyed the orders of Islam Nabih to torture Emad ElKebeer, the man was not that mean really and all his talk was about technical details about supposed errors in the investigation and interrogations papers and so but what made me laugh was his comparing the historical example of seizing Benjamin's royal cup when he was arrested in Egypt with the inability of Emad to prove that the one who was mentioned in the video was Reda.


After all this, the prosecutor asked for a postponing to have a look at the papers handled by the defence team, immediately one of the team suggested cancelling the handling of the papers (since the judicial session will end due to their vacation and will resume in September) and they objected this because according to them the accused Islam Nabih will stay in custody for more than the supposed penalty. As if they are so sure that he will be innocent from the sexual assault accusation.

In the end I want to mention that I was happy to meet Ahmed Abdul Fattah, Sokoot Hansawat, Mariam, Nawara Negm, Mina and Asad. Thanks for coming :).

House Of Egyptian Blogger Raided

House Of Egyptian Blogger Raided

Egyptian security forces raided on Sunday at dawn, June, 10, 2007, the house of the writer and blogger, Mohamed Mossad Yaqout. The security forces raided the blogger's house in Baltym, Kafr Al-Sheikh, at 2.00AM and disheveled the house furniture, seized the computer and a number of papers and books and they are still hunting Yaqout. Yaqout said in a phone call with Ikhwanweb that"The security forces want to arrest me because I support Ghobashi Al-Atawi and Ashraf Al Sayyed, the Muslim Brotherhood candidate in the Shura Council midterm elections for the constituency of Baltym. They want to detain me also because of my anti-regime writings. Yaqout, 26 years, confirmed that the State Security Police has no arrest warrant and it wants to detain him illegally. Yaqout, a researcher and web editor, is country chased by the security forces on groundless accusations. It is worth mentioning that Egyptian bloggers are facing harassments, bans and security manhunts to curb the freedom of speech and to stop opposition to the Egyptian authoritarian regime. Blogger Abdul Moneim Mahmoud, released several days ago, had been detained for publishing his torture stories under policemen in Egyptian police stations.

Round 4, if I can call it so. War On Bloggers

Arabist - Hossam Hamlawy

The Abbassiya Prosecutor interrogated today blogger and friend Amr Gharbeia on chrages of libel, part of the crackdown on the blogosphere orchestrated by Judge Abdel Fattah Mourad. The interrogation lasted for two hours and half, after which Amr was released on a LE200 bail.