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Egypt orders probe into new torture video AFP
January 8, 2007
CAIRO -- The Egyptian interior minister ordered security services to discover the identity of a female suspect apparently being tortured by police in a video publicized by the press, a security source said Monday.
A still frame from a video published on the front pages of the independent dailies Al Masri Al Youm and Al Fajr Sunday reportedly showed a screaming woman, tied to a bar hung between two chairs, being interrogated.
The short video, available on the Internet and showing a young woman painfully confessing to murder, was described as a police interrogation.
The order for an investigation comes hard on the heels of the detention of two policemen December 27 on charges of sexually assaulting a minibus driver after another graphic video was posted on the Web.
Human rights activists both inside and outside Egypt have repeatedly alleged that police use torture and abuse as a routine tool during questioning - a charge that the interior ministry denies.
In recent months, however, grainy amateur videos often taken using mobile phones have appeared purporting to show examples of police brutality.
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