Khashoggi: Defending what’s happening in Egypt is disgraceful

In response to a Human Rights Watch report on torture in Egypt, Saudi writer Jamal Khashoggi said: “Defending what is happening in Egypt is disgraceful”.

In an entry on Twitter, Khashoggi wrote:

What is going on in Egypt is painful, tolerating it is cowardice and defending it is a disgrace.

He retweeted several tweets from Human Rights Watch’s Twitter account about its report on torture in Egypt.

Human Rights Watch accused police officers and the security forces working under President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi of regularly torturing political detainees, using methods including beating, electric shocks and sometimes rape.

Joe Stork, deputy director for Middle East and North Africa at Human Rights Watch, said: “President Al-Sisi gave the police and national security officers permission to use torture whenever they wanted. And because of the immunity from suit they enjoy, citizens have lost all hopes in state justice.”

The Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the report reflected “a deliberate plan to incite violence and inflame public opinion” and contained “insubstantial allegations and an obvious attempt at politicisation” of the situation in Egypt.

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“Human Rights Watch is a respectable organisation that does not receive funds from Qatar or other countries and is adopted by many governments around the world as a neutral source,” Khashoggi wrote on Twitter.

“It is better for Egypt not to ignore the Human Rights Watch report,” he added.

#SisiEra

“Even US President Donald Trump’s administration can no longer defend or even tolerate the terrible violations that are taking place there.”

In response to unconvinced Twitter users, Khashoggi wrote: “I retweeted the Human Rights Watch’s report, some people were sceptical why it did not criticise Israel, Bashar or the Houthis, I say you should visit its website and you’ll find all of that.”