posted
Link (Sabbah's Blog): Prominent Egyptian blogger arrested during protest in Cairo in support of an independent judiciary.
The blogger arrested: Alaa of Manal and Alaa's bit bucket free speech from the bletches.
Article 19, Universal Declaration of Human Rights - Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
Link via TigerHawk who provides other links about Alaa's arrest and gives suggests action by fellow bloggers. Shining the spotlight of the Egyptian government is one thing we can do.
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Egyptian blogger arrested; what you can do Sandmonkey writes:
"As you can read here Alaa has been arrested , and the situation is turning bleaker by the minute. Given what the egyptian police is like , and how they wanted to hurt Alaa for quite a while now, I don't think it's wise to wait until they decide what THEY want to do with him. The fight should start immedietly.
"The contact information for the Egyptian embassy is below:
The Embassy of the Arab Republic of Egypt 3521 International Ct. NW Washington DC 20008 Phone (202) 895 5400 Fax (202) 244 5131 (202) 244 4319 Email: embassy@egyptembdc.org
Posts: 30135 | From: The owner of this website killed ES....... | Registered: Feb 2004
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i read that the other day... there was links to 2 videos in that text showing police brutality... have they been removed??????
Posts: 5642 | From: hellonearth.myfastforum.org Forum Index | Registered: Feb 2006
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Pro-democracy demonstrators have been locked up and reformist judges face dismissal for criticising the Egyptian regime over its grip on power. Rory McCarthy reports
Monday May 8, 2006
A year ago the Egyptian authorities were talking about political reform, promising to hold fair elections and open up one of the Arab world's more authoritarian regimes. But those days are long gone. Now the government has launched a crackdown against its critics, arresting pro-democracy activists and bringing legal cases against a group of outspoken senior judges. Yesterday, in the latest clash, police arrested 11 people at a demonstration near a south Cairo court. Three were later released, but the others, who include reform activists and the popular Egyptian blogger Alaa Abd El Fattah, were still being held. Around 48 people remain in custody after arrests in the past two weeks.
Several witnesses said protesters yesterday were beaten by riot police. Demonstrators were there to attend a court case brought against other activists in recent days. In a statement, a group of Egyptian human rights organisations condemned the arrests. "There is an urgent need for serious and hard work, not only to release the detained pro-democracy activists in Egypt but also to hold the perpetrators accountable for these savage practices," it said. Many of those detained are from Kefaya (Enough), a growing pro-democracy movement that has been organising street protests in recent years.
In the past, Egyptian police have arrested demonstrators and then released them after a few hours. The regime appears to be imposing a new, tougher policy of policing.
The latest crisis began during parliamentary elections in November last year. Usually Egypt's judges are called on to take part in the elections by supervising at the polling stations to prevent fraud. This time a group of several reformist judges, who have lobbied hard for a more independent judiciary and complained about routine state-sponsored vote-rigging in the past, were barred from election monitoring.
The ruling National Democratic Party dominated the election (although the Muslim Brotherhood, the conservative Islamic party, took a fifth of the seats even though hundreds of its supporters were rounded up and jailed) and evidence emerged of vote-rigging, frauds involving voter lists and coercion at the polling stations. Several of the senior reformist judges complained in public about the widespread irregularities.
There were already other serious doubts about the regime's reform commitments. Ayman Nour, who challenged President Hosni Mubarak in the first contested presidential election in September last year, was sentenced to five years' hard labour in December on questionable fraud charges.
Then this February, seven of the reformist judges were told they were under investigation and four were accused of "defaming the state". Two of the most outspoken judges have since been called before a disciplinary hearing and may lose their jobs.
Human rights groups are dismayed. "The government is punishing judges just for doing their job," Joe Stork, from Human Rights Watch, said last month. "It should be investigating the widespread evidence of voter intimidation, not shooting the messengers who reported the fraud."
There have been street protests and arrests in Cairo many times before, but such a public confrontation with the judges is unusual and may escalate in the months to come. Several more demonstrations are planned in the city for the weeks ahead.
Hisham al-Bastawisi, one of the two judges now facing a disciplinary hearing, is a deputy head of the Court of Cassation, the highest criminal court in Egypt. "Everybody realises what is happening," he said in an interview with the Guardian before the latest arrests. "It is a political action taken against us because we demanded reform. They are pushing us and we are pushing them. In the future we will have our reform, but we will have to pay a price."
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yes i psted one and its gone twice now ..so how come urs has stayed here ...
Posts: 1602 | From: the banana island shake me tweeeeeeee | Registered: Jan 2006
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oops i found myne the second one i did its in politics ,and tiger lily r u a member of the egyptian forum of the united kingdom run by mohamed soliman ...
Posts: 1602 | From: the banana island shake me tweeeeeeee | Registered: Jan 2006
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Alaa blogging from his Prison Submitted by alaa on Wed, 10/05/2006 - 18:49. Today it hit me, I am really an idiot. I'm not sure how I feel. I thought I was OK but I took forever to wake up. The way fellow prisoners look at me tells me I do not feel well but I can't really feel it.
I'd say prison is not like I expected, but I had no expectations. No images, not even fears, nothing. Guess it will take time. I expect to spend no less than a month here. I'm sure that's enough time to see all the ugly sides of prison, to be genuinely depressed.
I'm in a good cell I suppose. Only one of us with me, Karim Reda, a young Ghad member with no experience. I would have preferred to be surrounded by friends, or to be with someone with experience like Kamal Khalil who would inspire confidence in me and make sense of everything, but I should not complain.
The cell has 3asaker Geish written on it. They tell me it is for gara2em nafseya. Seems everyone here are facing 'darb afda ila qatl' . Their first time. 3 are only few years older than me, 2 in their early 30s, and two older guys. 2 been here since 2003, the rest less than a year. Their first kill (Only one claims to be innocent. Says he is a petty thief). All are sa3ayda living in Cairo, two are neighbors, living omrania, etc.
I could go like this, give a list of observations about my cellmates and the prison itself, like the fact that there are hundreds of cats here, but that's all it is. A list of observations, nothing sinking in, no feelings or emotions, no real impressions. Anyways it's a good cell.
The guys are taking good care of us, even though since Kefaya landed we brought them nothing but trouble. I spent the first day with the whole sector (3anbar) locked. No one was allowed out not even for a few minutes. Turns out this was punishment for the hunger strike. The way they figured it the criminal inmates would be so angry at us for bringing this on them, they'd make sure we break the hunger strike even if by force.
I do not know about other cells but in cell 7 they did not harm Karim. They tried to convince him to stop but did not even threaten. After a while, two of them became seriously concerned for Karim's health (he's been on hunger strike for 4 days). I am yet to join the strike. Decided to wait for word from outside or from Kamal Khalil or something.
Still I am writing this in English to prevent my cellmates from reading over my shoulders, not that I am sure this will work. They are all educated and some are very knowledgeable, in the span of two days we discussed everything, from Egyptology to biology to economics, lots of politics tab3an. I have to defend Kefaya and all the different movements, I have to explain about the judges and I have to explain why I'm here, why it's worth it, and to be frank I've no idea why. It isn't worth being away from Manal for three days let alone 30 (mashy ya masr) but I can't really say that, can I ?
Charm, you really want to know what Egyptians prisons are like? I assume Alaa receives a special treatment at the prison since many eyes incl. from abroad are watching the development in his case and of the others.
Posts: 30135 | From: The owner of this website killed ES....... | Registered: Feb 2004
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yes tigerlily.. i am following it on line... and yes, im quite sure he will be treated in as western a way as possible.
Posts: 5642 | From: hellonearth.myfastforum.org Forum Index | Registered: Feb 2006
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This may sound stupid, - but what is a blogger??? How does he get this publiced from his cell???
Posts: 1215 | From: Nowhere | Registered: Feb 2006
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