Egyptian writer calls for extrajudicial killing of opponents

Almasry Alyoum daily newspaper published an article written by the well-known playwright Ali Salem in which he calls on the Egyptian police apparatus to form special militias to carry out terrorist attacks against those opposed to Field Marshal Abd Al-Fattah Al-Sisi.

Salem called for disregarding the law and the judiciary, which he viewed as incompetent and ineffective when it comes to combating violence.

In a highly controversial article, Ali Salem said that police has the right to kill opponents who incite or commit violent acts against them. He even suggested that if any person torches an armoured police vehicle, the police should burn down his own home and the home of his family that same night, and then attribute the act to unknown assailants.

In addition, Salem suggested that it would then be possible to penalise a police officer who kills an opponent or who burns down his home with a two days deduction from his salary, or with a denial of his right to have the day off on Thursday and Friday.

Human rights lawyers considered Salem’s article a full-fledged crime that necessitates prosecuting the writer and the newspaper because what he wrote amounts to incitement to extrajudicial killing and the establishment of a state of militias.

“The existence of a police community that functions in complete secrecy will provide it with considerable abilities to obtain the necessary information. Humans have the tendency to support the powerful provided their safety is guaranteed. What matters, eventually, is that whoever torches a police armoured vehicle should have his home torched that same night by unknowns. If you are willing to monitor the moves of a police officer so as to kill him, then you and your family must know that you will be killed that same night.”

Salem admitted in his article that what he calls for represents an onslaught on the law. Nevertheless, he considers it fair because it is an act of “self-defence.”

“Would what I am calling for represent an onslaught on the law? Yes, please speak louder so that I can hear you. Yes, what I am asking for is not legal but it is by all standards fair. The greatest human right of all and the most sacred of them all is the right to self-defence. All I am asking for is to allow the police, and my father was once one of them, to defend themselves and their honour as members of one of the most honourable professions of all,” he wrote.