Wiki Thawra: More than 21,000 Egyptians arrested since Morsi's ouster

The Egyptian authorities have arrested 21,317 Egyptians since the military coup that ousted Egypt’s first democratically elected President Mohammed Morsi on July 3, 2013.

The information was published on Wiki Thawra, an independent website dedicated to documenting the deaths, arrests and casualties suffered since the Egyptian revolution in January 2011.

According to the website, there are currently 2,590 prominent Muslim Brotherhood members and leaders among the detainees. The military regime designated the Islamist movement a terrorist organisation on December 25, 2013.

Out of the 21,317 people detained in Egypt during the past six months, Wiki Thawra reports that 16,387 were arrested during protests or under political circumstances, 1,431 for violating the curfew, 89 for committing terrorist acts and 80 for sectarian violence.

The website also said that at least 740 of those arrested have been referred to military prosecution.

The interim Egyptian President Adly Mansour legalised the arrest of anti-coup protesters in November when he issued a protest law drafted by the ministry of justice and approved by the interim government.

The new law limits the right of peaceful assembly, as it requires a three day notice prior to any public gathering. Consequently, police have curbed most protests claiming that the protesters did not follow the correct legal procedures, such as getting permissions, or that they were violent.

The newspaper Daily News Egypt reported that the Qasr Al-Nil Misdemeanour Court extended on Sunday the temporary detention of 11 protesters who were arrested last Wednesday during a protest in solidarity with political detainees in Egypt.

The Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression in Egypt said that the 11 protesters are accused of illegal assembly, protesting without a permit, assaulting public employees, stalling traffic and displaying force.

On Saturday, Nasr City prosecutors extended the detention of 174 students from Al-Azhar University. The students are being held due to their on-campus protests, and are accused of inciting violence that occurred on December 28, 29 and 30, 2013.

Wiki Thawra was established by a group of independent youth. The web site aggregates data from reports by independent civil society organisations, including the Egyptian Centre for Economic and Social Rights, the Hisham Mubarak Law Centre and the Front to Defend Egypt’s Protesters.

The scope of the oppression in Egypt today makes it a challenge to document the causalities resulting from the harsh crackdown against anti-coup Egyptians. Domestic Egyptian human rights organisations have acknowledged the difficulties in collecting information; therefore, they often attribute their data to independent third party sources.