Egypt: media denies execution of Hisham Al-Ashmawy

Egyptian media denied yesterday what was published about implementing the death sentence against a former army officer Hisham Al-Ashmawy after a military court convicted him of carrying out “terrorist attacks” against Egyptian police and army forces.

Yesterday morning, Saudi Arabian channel Al-Arabiya in addition to Egyptian media including the online website of the state newspaper Al-Ahram said that the execution of Ashmawy “took place inside the Cairo Appeal Prison in the presence of a number of prison authority leaders, a member of the public prosecution, a forensic doctor and a member of Dar El Iftaa.”

However, a few hours after the publication of that news, Egyptian media said the news was not true, and some even apologised for its publication, stressing that “inaccurate sources” had quoted the news.

Also, Al-Arabiya News channel quoted Egyptian official sources as saying that the death sentence of Hisham Al-Ashmawy was not implemented.

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To date, the Egyptian Ministry of Interior has not issued any official statement regarding the implementation of the death sentence against Hisham Al-Ashmawy.

On his part, human rights lawyer Khaled Al-Masry, who is the lawyer of Hisham Al-Ashmawy, asserted that the family of Al-Ashmawy has not been formally notified about his execution. “All that was published in the media came from Al-Arabiya net, which we do not know its resources in this respect,” said Al-Masry, adding, “It is striking that all the media websites that had quoted Al-Arabiya removed the reports.”

Al-Ashmawy was convicted on 54 crimes that included assassinations of police officers, an attempt to assassinate the former Interior Minister, and bombings of several security facilities. In two of these cases, which are Farafra ambush and belonging to the Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis terrorist group, he was sentenced to death.

Al-Ashmawy is a former Egyptian special forces officer. He was dismissed for his radical views in 2012 and was captured last year in eastern Libya by the Libyan National Army and handed over to Egypt.