Amnesty International has condemned Egypt’s decision to refer the case of photojournalist Mahmoud Abu Zeid, widely known as Shawkan, to a criminal court, further extending his pre-trial detention, a statement by the organisation said.
“The decision to extend the detention of Shawkan until the criminal court sets a date for the trial, is disgraceful and a blatant violation of international human rights standards. It also contravenes the Egyptian constitution and national law which limits pre-trial detention to an already prolonged period of two years if the detainee is not sentenced within that period,” said Said Boumedouha, acting director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Programme.
“They now even flout their own laws in the process” of quashing dissent, Boumedouha said.
Shawkan was arrested on 14 August 2013 while he was taking pictures during the violent dispersal of the Rabaa Al-Adawiya sit-in by the Egyptian security forces. Up to 1,000 people were killed on that day across Egypt. He is now a prisoner of conscience. “All the charges against him must be dropped,” Boumedouha said.
His lawyers have been denied access to key documents relating to the case including the prosecutor’s referral decision which includes a list of charges, number of defendants, and penal code provisions applicable in the case, undermining their ability to prepare their defence. The prosecutor had initially denied Shawkan was among those referred to trial last week.
Shawkan and 400 others detained were accused of “belonging to a banned group” – the Muslim Brotherhood which the authorities later declared a “terrorist” organisation – “possessing firearms” and murder. He denied having ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and all the charges.
Since his arrest there have been violations of his rights, Amnesty explained, he was questioned by a prosecutor in the absence of a lawyer and was tortured and badly treated while being held in an overcrowded cell at a police station in Cairo.
Later, he was transferred to Abu Zabaal prison where he was held for seven hours in a police van outside the prison in the sweltering August heat before being allowed inside. There he was beaten once again. He is now at the infamous Tora prison where he is being held in very poor conditions.
In a letter describing the dire conditions he is being held in to Amnesty International published in April, Shawkan said he was treated “like an animal in Egyptian prisons” and said his indefinite detention is “psychologically unbearable”.
He was diagnosed with Hepatitis C before his arrest and his family told Amnesty that he is being denied medication so his health is deteriorating. They have submitted many appeals to the prosecutor requesting his release on medical grounds without success.
“Locking hundreds of people up in pre-trial detention for two years or more without justification is clearly a punitive measure to silence those who dare to challenge the official narrative,” said Boumedouha.
The extension of Shawkan’s detention comes the day after Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi signed a new “counterterrorism law” that will make it even easier for the authorities to hold detainees for long periods by giving the public prosecutor the power to hold people for investigation for a renewable period of up to seven days. There is no limit to the number of times it can be renewed. This removes the two year limit previously prescribed under Egyptian law.
The law’s definition of what constitutes a “terrorist act” is overly broad, and grants the authorities free rein to detain any government critics, including journalists, on vague grounds. The law also effectively bans independent reporting by imposing hefty fines for journalists who report information or statistics about terrorist attacks, if they differ from what has been announced by the state.