The Egyptian authorities must immediately halt the unjust prosecutions of three human rights activists arrested solely for organizing a peaceful event calling for the release of those arbitrarily detained, Amnesty International said today.
On 25 May, Egyptian police arrested pharmacist Hanan Altantawy, and lawyers Mohamed Abu al-Dayyar and Wafaa al-Masry, all members of the informal group the Committee to Defend Prisoners of Conscience (CDPC), for the group’s involvement in organizing a public event in Cairo two weeks earlier highlighting cases of people unjustly detained for political reasons. Altantawy and al-Masry were released on bail on the day of their arrest but prosecutors ordered that Abu al-Dayyar be held in pretrial detention for 15 days. All three face criminal investigations in connection with accusations of “disseminating false news”, with Abu al-Sayyar is additionally facing terrorism-related charges.
“By pursuing these unjust prosecutions, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s government is sending a clear message that it has no intention of changing course or addressing the country’s decade-long arbitrary detention crisis. It is rank hypocrisy for the authorities to claim progress on human rights to international partners such as the EU while arresting people for peacefully advocating justice and freedom for unjustly imprisoned activists, journalists and politicians,” said Mahmoud Shalaby, Regional Researcher at Amnesty International.
