Amnesty calls on Britain not to ignore human rights abuses in Egypt

Amnesty International has called on the British government not to ignore the crackdown in Egypt. This follows the request by Prime Minister David Cameron to investigate the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood in the UK yesterday.

Amnesty International UK’s Head of Policy and Government Affairs Allan Hogarth said: “It is of course perfectly legitimate for the UK to review security arrangements over the Muslim Brotherhood, but the UK must not let this distract from the fact that human rights abuses are being inflicted on large swathes of Muslim Brotherhood supporters in Egypt by the country’s increasingly repressive security services.”

Hogarth added: “Since the ousting of Mohammed Morsi last year, there’s been a huge crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood. Thousands of the movement’s supporters have been arrested, there are numerous reports of Muslim Brotherhood supporters being tortured in detention and – shockingly – 528 people were sentenced to death in one fell swoop last week after a grossly unfair trial.”

He pointed out that the Foreign Secretary William Hague has already expressed the governments “deep concern over Egypt’s mass death sentences” and that “it will make a nonsense of No10’s review if it doesn’t actually reflect human rights concerns like these.”