DNE: Egypt, Mugabe and a diplomatic slip-up

Egypt, Mugabe and a diplomatic slip-up

By Liam Stack
First Published: October 31, 2007

CAIRO: Last week Gamil Fayed became the newest addition to the Egyptian diplomatic corps when he presented his credentials to Robert Mugabe, the president of Zimbabwe, in a run-of-the-mill ceremony in Harare, the capital.

In his new role, Fayed will oversee an embassy staff of only two. He represents Cairo to a country coming apart at the seams under the weight of widespread social unrest and an inflation rate of 13,000 percent a year.

His position is hardly at the forefront of Egyptian diplomacy. But remarks he made after one of his first official meetings provoked uncomfortable back-tracking by superiors in Cairo and cast light on both Mugabe’s approach to the Arab world and Egypt’s attitude towards its African neighbors.

After meeting with the country’s Ministry of Agriculture, Fayed made routine promises to provide Harare with agricultural advice, according to the Zimbabwean state-run daily The Herald.

But the quote picked up by the paper, and nervously criticized by Cairo, was far from a bland commitment to fertilizer sales.

“I would like to express my government's support to Zimbabwe's land reform and mechanization programs,” the paper quoted Fayed as saying.

Land reform in southern Africa, and Zimbabwe in particular, is a touchy subject.

During the era of white minority rule in Zimbabwe, then called Rhodesia, the white elite comprised one percent of the population but owned 70 percent of the country’s arable land.

After the end of minority rule in 1980, the new government began to commandeer many of the large agricultural estates owned by the white elite.
In theory, the reform program would alleviate poverty by dividing up the land among poor blacks, while the white farmers were to be given fair compensation.
But in practice, say critics, the Mugabe regime carried out the policy thuggishly.

They say much of the land was turned over to political allies with no experience or intention of farming it, creating an economic and humanitarian catastrophe.
In addition, they accuse the state of unleashing a campaign of violence to intimidate both the small white population and the president’s political opponents, whatever their race.

Before Mugabe came to power, the country was a net exporter of foodstuffs and seen as a bread basket of Africa.

Now, more than two decades after land reform began, Zimbabwe is in a shambles. It is racked by quintuple-digit inflation and more than 45 percent of the country is malnourished. It has been heavily sanctioned by western governments, and Mugabe himself is one of world politics’ personae-non-grata.

After Fayed’s statements in Harare, representatives of the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs reacted with nervous bewilderment. Speaking to a foreign reporter, one expressed a sense that Ambassador Fayed made a rookie mistake and was not reading from the right page in Cairo’s playbook.

“This man is really dreaming,” said a senior official in the Ministry’s Division of African Affairs, who did not want to go on record criticizing a colleague. “These are explosive comments. This is just not what our relationship with Zimbabwe is about.”

According to the diplomat, Egypt’s main interaction with Zimbabwe is to occasionally provide it with technical advice or humanitarian assistance through the Egyptian Fund for Technological Cooperation with Africa. Every year the Fund sends a handful of physicians and engineers to the country.

“There is no agreement between Egypt and Zimbabwe when it comes to land reform — not at all,” he told Daily News Egypt. “I think Fayed was just making up the speech as he went along. This is just humorous, it is completely invented, that we agree with them on this or would even consider agreeing with them.”

“Even in informal meetings we have with the Zimbabweans, we don’t even bring up land reform. It is a very sensitive issue with them. We think it is an internal Zimbabwean issue and we don’t have any official position on it.”

While the official was careful to point out that Cairo considers Mugabe’s land reform policies to be an internal affair, he was also emphatic that Egypt’s experience of land reform bore no resemblance to the controversial and bloody Zimbabwean model.

“Our land reform in the 1960s under Nasser was completely different than what they are doing there,” he emphasized. “Completely different.”

Cairo’s presence in Southern Africa is also felt through its investments in the telecom sector, where Egyptian giant Orascom has competed against local firms for a share in the regional mobile phone market.

Until earlier this year, it had met some success in Zimbabwe. Orascom was a 60 percent owner of local firm Telecel Zimbabwe, with the other 40 percent of the funds invested by a local group of shareholders called the Empowerment Group of Zimbabwe.

But in August the Mugabe regime revoked Telecel’s license, and accused Orascom of not doing enough to attract more Zimbabwean investors. Egyptian diplomats are quick to write off the dispute as a misunderstanding.

Observers of the relationship between Cairo and Harare say that it is not just limited to aid missions and investment deals.

Simon Myambo, a former professor of development studies at Belvedere Teacher’s College in Harare, expresses surprise at the offer of development assistance from Cairo.

But he suggests that business deals and aid offers like these are backed up by a personal relationship between the two countries’ presidents.

Because of the sanctions imposed on his country by Europe and America, western multinationals cannot invest in Zimbabwe and Mugabe cannot travel there. In response, he tries to attract support and investment from China and the Islamic world under his regime’s “Look East” policy.

“Mugabe always stops here to visit on his way to summits at the UN or to visit investors or friends in places like Malaysia or China,” says Myambo. “When he comes here he always stays for a few days. He has already been here about five or six times this year.”

According to Myambo, “Look East” deserves credit for the Orascom deal as well as Mugabe’s recent success in attracting major investments from Qatar-based Venessia Petroleum.

Earlier this month, the Gulf firm announced plans to build a 120,000 barrel-per-day refinery in Harare, at a cost of $1.5 billion. In addition, its sister company will build a five-star hotel in downtown Harare.

“Mugabe has been trying to woo the entire Middle East, because he can’t go to Europe anymore,” explains Myambo. “It is all part of his ‘Look East’ policy, which includes Egypt as one of the strongest countries in the Middle East.”

But if Mugabe is looking east, officials at the Egyptian Foreign Ministry insist that Cairo is also looking south.

They insist that the ruined investments, small humanitarian missions and bungled speeches that are the hallmark of the ties between Cairo and Harare do not do justice to Egypt’s role in Africa at large.

According to them, Egypt is a natural leader on the continent.

They say it has played an important historical role in bringing civilization and freedom from colonialism to its southern neighbors, and point to investments and aid work in countries like Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi and Nigeria as evidence of that.

“Egypt is a leader in Africa,” said the official in the Ministry’s Division of African Affairs, who spoke to Daily News Egypt on condition of anonymity.

“We are a pioneer in everything,” he said. “We are one of the most important countries, and one of the biggest economies, on the continent. We helped the entire African continent gain independence, and we have always been eager to help them develop and to provide humanitarian aid when disasters happen.”

“In terms of civilization and culture Egypt has been a pioneer,” he added.

“Egyptian civilization is 7,000 years old. Most African countries are new and are not deeply rooted like Egypt. We were here when there was no one else”

DNE: Harassed journalists file complaints against Ain Shams University

Harassed journalists file complaints against Ain Shams University

By Liam Stack
First Published: October 29, 2007

CAIRO: Two journalists have filed a series of complaints against both campus security at Ain Shams University and its president, Ahmed Zaki Badr, and say that guards obstructed them from reporting on student demonstrations last week, blocking one man’s entrance to the campus and violently beating another who made it inside.

Aboul Seoud Mohamed, a journalist with Al-Masry Al-Youm, says that security forces barred him from entering the campus when he went to cover the demonstrations protesting vote-rigging and state interference in student body elections.

“I gave the security officers at the gates my card saying that I am a journalist and a member of the syndicate, but they said that I couldn’t enter unless I had a special pass,” Mohamed told Daily News Egypt. “I knew this wasn’t right, so I called the President of the University, Ahmed Zaki Badr, and he said he would send someone from the public relations (PR) office down to escort me in to the campus.

“I waited for two hours and no one came,” he added. “I called the president’s office and the PR office again and again and no one ever came down.”

While he stood waiting outside the university, Mohamed says he saw Amr Sharaf, a photographer from Al Dostour, come stumbling out. He had been badly beaten.

“He was badly hurt and had wounds on his head,” says Mohamed. “He said he had been beaten by a police officer.

“We tried to take a picture of Amr Sharaf and his wounds but the security officers said we couldn’t because it would tarnish the reputation of the university.”

Sharaf could not be reached for comment at press time, but according to reports published in Al-Masry Al-Youm he was beaten with clubs by campus police and a mob of plainclothes officers until he lost consciousness. He was later hospitalized at Ain Shams University Hospital.

According to the complaint, the two have accused Ahmed Helmy, an officer with campus security, and President Ahmed Zaki Badr of illegally denying Mohamed access to the grounds of the university.

Sherif Kadry, another officer with campus security, stands accused of smashing Sharaf’s camera and assaulting him along with a number of unidentified plainclothes agents.

Security was on high alert on the day of the demonstrations, which witnesses say drew 500 student activists to the campus to chant slogans against both the Mubarak regime and university president Ahmed Zaki Badr, son of a former Interior Minister.

Students complain that university officials loyal to the ruling National Democratic Party intervened in student elections, disqualifying candidates seen as not being loyal enough to the government. Islamist candidates in particular were barred from running for seats in the student union.

Such tactics are a common feature of Egypt’s annual student elections, as the government tries to ensure that student unions at the nation’s largest
universities do not become a platform for opposition groups.

Protests and clashes erupted at several universities after last week’s elections, with students across the country complaining that votes were being rigged by state security forces and NDP loyalists within university administrations.

In Zagazig University alone, located at the delta town of Zagazig, the university disqualified more than 500 students from running for office based on their perceived political affiliation.

DNE: Security detains Brotherhood students after violence at Ain Shams University

Security detains Brotherhood students after violence at Ain Shams University

By Liam Stack
First Published: October 25, 2007

CAIRO: State security forces arrested 13 students at Ain Shams University affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) on Wednesday after violent clashes between student groups and uniformed and plainclothes security forces during a protest against alleged vote rigging on Monday’s student elections.

Students complain that university officials disqualified candidates not aligned with the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP), and focused on barring Islamist candidates in particular.

Such tactics are a common feature of the country’s annual student elections, as the government tries to ensure that student unions at the nation’s largest universities do not become a platform for opposition groups.

According to witnesses, roughly 500 students from a range of opposition movements gathered in front of university administrator’s offices to collect signatures against vote rigging and chant slogans.

“We decided that we wanted to have a big demonstration and a sit-in because the government would not let the elections happen freely,” Mohamed Soliman, a student at the Faculty of Arts and a member of the MB told Daily News Egypt.

“This happens every year. The rules are always broken in student elections in Egypt.”

Shortly after gathering, they say they were attacked by uniformed security forces and a crowd of plainclothes agents wielding machetes, Molotov cocktails and clubs.

The Brotherhood’s website claims that 13 students were detained by police, although student protestors say that 14 were detained by university security and nine were later transferred to El Waily police station.

At least one man, Amr Sharaf, a photographer with the opposition daily Al Dostour, was hospitalized at Ain Shams University hospital after being beaten by plainclothes officers, who took the memory cards out of his camera.

Student protestors blame the university administration for the violence, and in particular attack its president Ahmed Zaki Badr. He is the son of former Minister of the Interior Zaki Badr, who was the target of an assassination attempt in 1987 for allegedly sanctioning torture in prisons and his fierce campaign against Islamists.

“Ahmed Zaki Badr refused to meet with student protestors, instead he called in these thugs to attack us, he gave them the orders and watched the whole thing,” said Soliman.

“He is the president of this university and he is responsible when violence like this happens here,” he added.

Protests and clashes have accompanied voting at universities across the country this week, as student union elections are scheduled to take place under the watchful eye of state security.

Opposition groups complain of widespread government interference in student elections, and say that university administrators loyal to the NDP routinely disqualify candidates considered insufficiently loyal to the government.

In Zagazig University alone, in the delta town of Zagazig, the university disqualified more than 500 students from running for office based on their perceived political affiliation.

DNE: Trial date set for refugee gang murder, lawyers insist wrong men are charged

Trial date set for refugee gang murder, lawyers insist wrong men are charged

By Liam Stack
First Published: October 23, 2007

CAIRO: More than four months after the annual World Refugee Day at the American University in Cairo was disrupted by gang violence that left one man dead outside the university premises, the state prosecutor has agreed to bring the case to trial on Nov. 6.

But friends and family of the eight defendants insist they were innocent bystanders swept up in a frantic police crackdown following the murder, which occurred during a fight between two Sudanese gangs, the Outlaws and the Lost Boys.

“The men that the police arrested were not the ones who were involved in the fighting,” said Mohamed Bayoumi, a lawyer representing the defendants. “The ones who committed this crime ran away before the police arrived, so the police just arrested anyone who was there.

“The ones they arrested are innocent. They did not do anything,” he added.

Seven of the men are charged with possession of knives, a crime which carries a sentence of three months to one year in prison. One of the defendants is charged with “accidental murder,” for which he may face seven to ten years in jail.

According to witnesses to the attack, a gang of Sudanese men wielding machetes attacked another Sudanese man on the sidewalk outside AUC’s Greek Campus, hacking at his arms and head.

After the assault the gang of attackers quickly dispersed, leaving the victim, identified in as Taha Malea Fealjour Bekam, on a sidewalk streaked with blood.

Police arrived soon after and began arresting all the Sudanese men they saw in the vicinity in what some have described as a random, hurried manner.

One of the defendants, Essam Eddin Jubbara, was arrested while hailing a taxi near the university, according to friends. He had been working as a volunteer at World Refugee Day and was leaving with two Sudanese friends when they were detained by police.

He and his friends are among those charged with weapons possession, but friends say it is impossible that Jubbara or his friends were involved in the attack.

They say none of the three were involved in the gangs, and that Jubbara, who is recognized as a refugee by the UNHCR, was an upstanding member of the refugee community. He spent his free time helping out his fellow refugees and babysitting, according to friends, and was supposed to start his studies this semester at Cairo University.

They additionally point out that both the Lost Boys and the Outlaws are based in the Cairo neighborhoods of Maadi and Ain Shams, but Essam lived in Bab El-Louq and had little contact with those communities.

“The people who committed this crime must be laughing,” said Peroline Ainsworth, a friend of Jubbara. “They’ve arrested the wrong people.”

As for the two men arrested with Jubbara, they do not live in Egypt at all, and were only visiting from Sudan to attend a training course hosted by EgyptAir.

According to Bayoumi, the lawyer for the defense, the state prosecutor’s office takes special interest in cases involving Sudanese refugees because they are afraid that the community will organize more demonstrations like the 2005 protest in Mustafa Mahmoud square.

Thousands of refugees took part in a high-profile sit-in in the Mohandiseen roundabout that year, which ended in a bloody crackdown by state security forces in which as many as 30 refugees, mainly women and children, were killed.

“After the violence that occurred at the square, they are always afraid that the Sudanese are going to organize another demonstration,” he told Daily News Egypt. “They are just scared.”

Estimates on the number of refugees in Egypt vary wildly. According to the UNHCR, it has officially registered 45,000 refugees in the country, mainly from Sudan, Somalia and Iraq. But some independent estimates push that figure to as many as three million.

DNE: International labor groups condemn conviction of labor leader Kamal Abbas

International labor groups condemn conviction of labor leader Kamal Abbas

By Liam Stack
First Published: October 21, 2007

CAIRO: A string of international labor and human rights groups have come out in support of Kamal Abbas — the director of the shuttered Center for Trade Union and Worker Services (CTUWS) — condemning a recent court decision which sentenced him and a freelance journalist associated with his group to one year in prison.

The two were convicted of defamation and public abuse after writer Mohamed Helmy published an article on corruption at the 15th of May Youth Center, where he was a member of the board. The story was published in Kalam Sanay’iya, a magazine published by the CTUWS.

Last week, the International Confederation of Trade Unions (ITUC) issued a statement expressing its “most serious condemnation” of the conviction.
The group, which represents 168 million workers in 153 countries, accused the government of orchestrating the convictions as part of its broader crackdown on opposition groups and independent media.

“We are very concerned about this latest attack on the CTUWS,” said Guy Ryder, ITUC general secretary, in a statement released to the press. “We are particularly concerned that these prison sentences follow a long tradition of repression of the CTUWS, an independent civil society organization committed to defending trade union and workers rights in Egypt.

“We cannot accept that the CTUWS be intimidated through the courts or otherwise for actions that are perfectly legal and legitimate,” he added.
In addition to the ITUC, statements of support have poured in from a number of European organizations.

A coalition of the three largest Italian trade unions sent a letter to President Hosni Mubarak urging him to “ensure that CTUWS is not persecuted” and demanding that “this particular case could be reviewed.”

The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network also issued a statement “expressing its deep concern” over the case.

The conviction has attracted particular attention and anger from rights groups because in between the publication of the corruption accusations and the two men’s September conviction, an investigation launched by the Governor of Cairo revealed the charges against the youth center management to be true.

After the investigation, Cairo Governor Abdel Azim Wazir ordered the entire board of the center to be disbanded and singled out Chairman Mohamed Mustafa Ibrahim for particular censure.

In an ironic twist, it was Ibrahim who filed the case against Abbas and Helmy, and on Sept. 30 the Helwan Misdemeanor Court ruled in his favor.

“The article that we published about the 15th of May Youth Center was based on facts and research which proved the corruption,” Abbas told Daily News Egypt. “Those complaints and facts were all accurate and legitimate, and eventually led to many of the problems at the center being solved.

“Ibrahim filed his suit against both the writer and I before it was clear to everyone that the facts were true, and before the problems there were solved,” he added.

In a statement released to the media, the CTUWS expressed “extreme concern” at what it called an “unbelievable sentence.”

The group says it plans to appeal the conviction at a court session scheduled for Dec. 29, and both Abbas and Helmy remain free until the appeals have been completed.

DNE: Syrian rights activist condemns motives behind Brotherhood trial

Syrian rights activist condemns motives behind Brotherhood trial

By Liam Stack
First Published: October 18, 2007

CAIRO: Lawyer and human rights activist Gamila Sadek, a representative of the Syrian Bar Association and the Paris-based Arab Committee for Human Rights, like several would-be observers before her, has recently been barred from attending the trial of 40 Muslim Brotherhood leaders.

The trial has attracted widespread attention both at home and abroad, largely because the defendants were acquitted of the same charges of membership of a banned organization and money laundering before a civilian judge.

“Referring civilians to military courts is wrong, this is not why military courts exist,” Sadek told Daily News Egypt. “The government already knows what verdict it wants to see in the court and has forged evidence to make its point. It has all been pre-arranged from the beginning. The whole thing is illegal, unconstitutional and illegitimate.”

Sadek says she is not surprised that, like all the observers before her, she was barred from the trial. Even though no one has yet been successful in observing the proceedings, she thinks that it is important for observers to keep trying.

“We have sent four observers before me to observe nine separate court sessions, but each time they have gone to the court our observers have been denied access,” she says. “Nevertheless, it is important to come and highlight the political nature of these trials. They are full of legal violations as well, but we think that the political aspects of the case are the most important.”

According to Sadek, the military trial is only one front in a widely reaching government crackdown on opposition figures that also extends to factory workers and newspaper editors. But she thinks it is significant due to both the personal wealth and economic influence of many Brotherhood leaders and the public support that the movement enjoys.

“The Muslim Brotherhood includes some very wealthy members who have accumulated a lot of influence in the economy, and the government is afraid of their growing economic power,” she says.

“The economic rise of the Brotherhood is competition for the economic monopoly of the National Democratic Party and its elites. That is why they have been charged with money laundering, to attack their finances and block their economic achievements.”

Despite the wealth that many of its leaders have accumulated, Sadek says that Egyptian society’s religious devotion has kept many people from considering the Brotherhood to be just another gang of elites.

An avowed secularist and one-time communist, Sadek says that while she herself is not swayed by religious arguments she thinks that for many people the movement’s piety is a big part of its attraction.

“The Arab public usually supports Islamist parties because they think that they are the only ones who can actually fulfill their promises and meet the people’s demands. Most Arabs are religious Muslims so they find Islamist parties generally attractive.”

But she says the movement’s Islamic piety also gives the regime an effective means of attacking it, and accuses the regime of attracting Western support for cracking down on opposition groups by painting Islamist activists and politicians as violent extremists.

“The regime here is cracking down on Islamists in part to please Western governments,” she says. “It has done a good job of spreading the image that Islamists are all radicals and terrorists, and uses this image to gain the support of Western governments.”

“But it’s not true that they are all like that, and it is not true that they are the only ones suffering now,” she adds. “The crackdown we are seeing in Egypt now does not just include Islamists. This is not just about the Brotherhood. The government is attacking everyone, and cracking down on leftists and secularists as well.”

DNE: MB military trial resumes today as human rights observer arrives in Egypt

MB military trial resumes today as human rights observer arrives in Egypt

By Liam Stack
First Published: October 16, 2007

CAIRO: The military trial of Muslim Brotherhood leader Khayrat El Shater and 39 others continues today, as the latest in a string of foreign human rights lawyers attempts to observe the proceedings, which have so far been closed to both media and international monitors.

Gamila Sadek, a Syrian attorney representing the Paris-based Arab Committee for Human Rights, arrived in Egypt last night. She is one of several representatives of that group who have tried to observe the trial. All have been turned away.

“She will attend the trial, but we don’t expect that they will let her enter because they don’t let anyone in,” Zahraa El Shater told Daily News Egypt.
Zahraa is the daughter of Khayrat El Shater and the wife of Ayman Abdel Ghany, who is also a defendant in the case.

“It is good to see that there are organizations and people out there who support us, but for the Egyptian government it doesn’t matter,” she continued. “They won’t let her in, but we do appreciate her support.”

Khayrat El Shater and his co-defendants stand accused of being members of a banned organization and money laundering, charges which they were acquitted of before a civil court last year.

On the day of their acquittal they were re-arrested before leaving the courtroom and recharged with the same crimes before a military court, which is empowered to sentence them to death and whose decisions they cannot appeal.

The Brotherhood is Egypt’s most influential opposition group. It holds 88 seats in the 454 member People’s Assembly, which it won during a brief period of political opening that coincided with elections in the fall of 2005.

Since then, over a thousands members of the group have been detained, including top leaders like El Shater.

DNE: Responses to worker unrest a government tactic, says observer

Responses to worker unrest a government tactic, say observers

By Liam Stack
First Published: October 3, 2007

CAIRO: Life in the delta town of Mahalla was disrupted last week by a boisterous strike at the mammoth Ghazl El Mahalla industrial complex, where 27,000 workers walked off the job and took up residence with their families in a tent city inside the factory gates.

At energetic rallies in front of the factory gates, workers banged drums and chanted slogans against a cast of would-be villains including their local government-appointed union committee, the chairman of the board of Misr Spinning and Weaving, and the World Bank.

They demanded a host of changes ranging from the payment of promised bonuses to the dissolution of Egypt’s union system and the overthrow of President Mubarak.

The strike had its roots in a similar protest last December. That strike ended when management and the state promised to improve working conditions and include employees in a profit-sharing deal that would pay them a bonus equal to 150 days wages if the company turned a profit of more than LE 60 million.

At the end of the fiscal year in July, Misr Spinning and Weaving posted profits of more than LE 170 million although workers only received a bonus of 20 days’ pay.

Worker leaders reacted with outrage. They accused the management of reneging on its promises and began to organize for a new action.

After striking for six days, the workers’ negotiating team abandoned many of their more radical political demands and focused instead on winning a verbal commitment to the payment of their bonuses. In talks that stretched late into the night, the two sides agreed upon a deal that independent observers say is both financially generous and politically significant.

“The settlement is pretty remarkable for a couple of reasons,” said Joel Beinin, the director of the Middle Eastern Studies department at the American University in Cairo.

“In terms of the economic issues, the workers pretty much won everything they wanted, and they did it pretty quickly.”

According to Sayed Habib, a leader of the Mahalla movement, the management agreed to pay the workers an immediate bonus equal to 70 days’ wages. They also pledged to pay a later bonus of 60 days’ wages after consulting with the firm’s administrative general assembly.

While management failed to commit to the principle of profit-sharing, they promised that future bonuses will be larger than in the past and will also be tied to an annual salary increase of seven percent.

The negotiations did score some political victories even though they did not result in extreme changes such as the overthrow of the regime or the dissolution of the Egyptian Trade Union Federation (ETUF) — a government body formed in 1957 and widely seen as a tool of state repression.

Chief among them was the forced resignation of company CEO Mahmoud El Gibali and the firm’s board of directors.

“That is a pretty political thing to do, considering that this is a public sector company and those guys are all government appointees,” says Beinin.

Additionally, the chairman of the factory’s local union committee also resigned after he was hospitalized following an attack by a group of striking workers. Like all members of the local union committee, he too was appointed by the state.

As the largest and one of the oldest public sector enterprises in Egypt, Ghazl El Mahalla has always served as one of the bellwethers of labor unrest. What workers there win from the state, workers elsewhere can be expected to demand as well.

For that reason, Beinin thinks Mahalla will inspire more strikes in the coming months, and that the regime will most likely continue to appease workers’ economic demands while overlooking the political ones.

“The Mahalla workers are in an almost unique position vis-à-vis the government because their legitimacy is unassailable,” he told Daily News Egypt.

“Their enterprise is the flagship enterprise of Egyptian economic nationalism, and unlike many textile firms, it is profitable. But the workers there are paid a pathetic amount of money that it is impossible to raise a family on.

“Everyone but the business elite supports them,” he added. “I think the regime has either decided that it should help them, or that it has to.”

The government’s conciliatory approach to labor unrest is in stark contrast to the increasingly repressive measures it has taken over the last year against dissent from the middle class and urban intellectuals.

Some, like AUC Professor Saad Eddin Ibrahim, have fled the country. Others, such as newspaper editor Ibrahim Eissa or Muslim Brotherhood leader Khayrat El Shater, have been subjected to grueling trials within the civil or military justice system that critics dismiss as kangaroo courts.

While it appears the regime is trying to smother working class dissent with financially favorable settlements, Beinin warns that the regime’s willingness to pay out could quickly harden if workers pressed their demand for the dissolution of the ETUF.

“The demand for an independent labor union has been around for at least a decade, but there has never really been any rank-and-file organizing around it,” he says.

“What is happening in Mahalla is the first real instance of that,” he added. “But the regime will fight very, very hard against this demand. Control of the union apparatus is one of its main tools for retaining power and has been for years.”

The distance between the ETUF and workers is the most serious problem in labor politics, says Kamal Abbas, the director of the Center for Trade Union and Worker Services, which was shut down by the authorities in March.

He says that as long as the union fails to represent workers, more strikes are inevitable.

“The real problem here is that the union is isolated from the workers themselves,” he says. “This problem has not been solved, and because of that and other problems the strikes will just continue.”

“It is just like with anything else,” he added. “If the problems are not addressed, then they will only lead to the same outcomes.”

DNE: Director of labor rights group, freelance journalist sentenced to one year for defamation

Director of labor rights group, freelance journalist sentenced to one year for defamation

By Liam Stack
First Published: October 3, 2007

CAIRO: Kamal Abbas, the director of the Center for Trade Union and Worker Services (CTUWS), a high-profile labor rights group shut down by the authorities last winter, was sentenced to one year in prison for defamation.

The case was filed against both him and a freelance writer for the group’s magazine, after it published allegations of corruption against a Cairo youth center which later proved to be true.

Both Abbas and the writer, Mohamed Helmy, were sentenced by the Helwan Misdemeanor Court, but remain free pending an appeal which will be heard on Dec. 26.

The charges were published in Kalam Sanay’iya, the magazine of the Center for Trade Union and Worker Services, which was shut down in March after the state accused it of threatening national security by encouraging workers to strike.

In the article, Helmy alleged that the management of the 15th of May Youth Center was corrupt, and laid the blame on Mohamed Mustafa Ibrahim, the chairman of its board and a member of the National Democratic Party who was once a parliamentary candidate.

When the article appeared, Ibrahim sued both Helmy and Abbas for “public abuse” and “defamation of his capacity as a public representative.”

The author claimed inside knowledge of the center’s operations because he was also a member of its board of directors, and, along with four other board members filed a complaint against Ibrahim before Cairo governor Abdel Azim Wazir last year.

Wazir assigned a task force to investigate the charges, which released a report last January confirming Helmy’s allegations of financial misconduct and recommending that Ibrahim be removed from his position.

In response, Wazir disbanded the entire board of the 15th of May Center, relieving both Helmy and Ibrahim of their duties.

Abbas stands by the article, saying that the governor’s action against the center’s management proves that it was based on facts.

“The article that we published about the 15th of May Youth Center was based on facts and research,” he told Daily News Egypt.

“Those complaints and facts were all accurate and legitimate, and eventually led to solving many of the problems at the center.”

“Ibrahim filed his suit against both the writer and I before it was clear to everyone that the facts were true, and before the problems there were solved,” he added.

In a statement released to the media, the CTUWS expressed “extreme concern” at what it called an “unbelievable sentence.”

It says the sentence is just another example of the regime’s crackdown on both free speech and non-governmental organizations, and demanded the government “annul penalties which restrict freedom of publishing and also called for Egyptians to “defend freedom of expression.”

DNE: Wage concessions end Mahalla strike, leave political demands unaddressed

Wage concessions end Mahalla strike, leave political demands unaddressed

By Liam Stack
First Published: September 30, 2007

MAHALLA EL KOBRA: The Ghazl El Mahalla workers’ movement ended its week-long strike early on Saturday morning after negotiations with management and the state-controlled Egyptian Trade Union Federation yielded concessions on wages and working conditions, although the strike’s political demands have not been met.

The strike, which united more than 27,000 employees of Egypt’s largest public sector plant and brought production at the Misr Spinning and Weaving Company to a stand-still, was the second to grip the site in the dusty industrial city of Mahalla in less than a year.

The most recent protest began last week, when workers said that management and the ETUF had reneged on a series of promises they made after last December’s strike.

At that time, workers were told that conditions at the factory would improve and that they could participate in a profit-sharing deal that would pay them bonuses equal to 150 days pay if the company turned a profit of more than LE 60 million.

At the end of the fiscal year in July, workers in Mahalla complained that the firm posted profits of more than LE 200 million, but that they had only received a bonus of 20-days pay.

Combined with the abysmal conditions in the plant and what workers call widespread corruption, the broken profit sharing promise ignited a new wave of frustration and militancy among the company’s employees.

“The people on strike are the factory workers, the office workers, the engineers, the people who work in the management building — everyone except for the board of directors,” one protestor, who was afraid to give his name, told Daily News Egypt during the strike.

“We are here because [Minister of Manpower] Aisha Abdel Hady and [Minister of Investment] Mahmoud Mohieddin made promises to us in the last strike but now they say they didn’t promise us anything,” he added. “We are here because they are liars.”

But after one week of high-profile strikes, dubbed “The Mahalla Intifada” by some independent Arabic-language dailies, the management of the firm has renewed its rhetorical commitment to many of those promises.

According to Sayed Habib, a leader of the Mahalla Workers Movement, the management has agreed to pay the workers an immediate bonus equal to 70-days pay and additionally will pay a later bonus of 60-days wages after a meeting of the firm’s administrative general assembly.

They have not agreed to the principle of profit sharing in the future, although they say that future bonuses will be larger than in the past and tied to an annual salary increase of 7 percent. Management has also agreed to consider the days of the sit-in a paid vacation, and says that no worker will be penalized for their participation in the action.

For its part, the government has promised to form a committee in the Ministry of Investment to negotiate hazard pay for workers whose jobs expose them to dangerous conditions or health risks, as many positions in the textile mill do. They will also increase each worker’s clothing allowance.

“We are happy with the deal that was reached,” said Habib. “It is a good deal for us.”

While the concessions made by management are a welcome boon to the lives of some of Egypt’s poorest workers, Saturday’s pre-dawn agreement addressed none of the political demands made by the increasingly politicized Mahalla movement.

After last December’s strike, in which the workers’ local union sided with management against them, the workers’ movement collected over 14,000 signatures calling for the impeachment of local union officials and the dissolution of the ETUF.

They say the national union body is an arm of the state, and cares more about keeping the Mubarak regime in power than it does about defending the interests of the working class.

But the ETUF has consistently ignored the worker’s petitions, and their demands for reform have never been the subject of any negotiation between workers and the state.

Habib says that the movement is “still in discussions” with management about forming a free union, but that in the meantime they are considering other options for exerting pressure on their bosses from within the existing union framework.

“We are thinking about forming a worker’s collective at the factory,” he says. “We hope that a collective would be able to put pressure on the union committee here to listen to us and fight harder for demands we make.”

DNE: Striking Mahalla workers demand government fulfill broken promises

Striking Mahalla workers demand government fulfill broken promises

By Liam Stack and Maram Mazen

First Published: September 27, 2007

Workers at Ghazl el Mahalla complain they are "not treated like human beings."

Photo by Liam Stack

EL MAHALLA EL KOBRA: A crippling strike at Egypt’s largest public sector factory entered its fifth day on Thursday as workers, angry at corruption and what they call a string of lies and broken promises, say they will not end their occupation of the factory until their demands have been met by both the company’s board of directors and by President Hosni Mubarak.

The strike has united more than 27,000 employees of the Misr Spinning and Weaving Company, from manual laborers to more highly skilled engineers and clerical staff, and has brought production at the factory in the dusty Delta city of Mahalla to a standstill.

Workers in Mahalla complain of low wages which leave them subject to grinding poverty, abuse by management, corruption, and above all a host of unfulfilled government promises made after a similarly large strike last December.

Workers throughout the company insist that they want nothing more than what is rightfully theirs, and accuse their managers of widespread corruption and violating past agreements.

“We just want them to treat us like human beings,” said one man, who like most of the strikers preferred to remain anonymous for fear of possible reprisals by management or its allies in state security.

“There is corruption in this company,” alleged another man “They treat us badly. There is mismanagement and they are bad at planning for the future.”

“If the chairman gave us the price of one of the iftar meals that he eats, it would be enough to pay us what is rightfully ours,” shouted a third.

In last December’s strike, the shop floor came to a standstill over the non-payment of bonuses workers said they were promised by a government decree guaranteeing public sector employees an annual bonus equal to two months salary.

Ghazl El Mahalla management said that the decree did not apply to workers in public sector factories, but was only meant for employees in government ministries and offices.

The workers’ union, which they say is corrupt and dominated by loyalists of the ruling National Democratic Party, sided with management.

Workers said the union did not represent them and staged a strike despite its opposition, which ended after management and the Ministry of Labor conceded to many of the workers’ demands. They gave the strikers a one and a half month bonus and made a host of other promises, including a commitment to profit sharing.

That profit sharing agreement is at the crux of the new strike, say workers. Under it, management agreed that if Misr Spinning and Weaving turned a profit of more than LE 60 million, then it would set aside 10 percent of that to be distributed among the 27,000 employees. Under the deal, each worker was supposed to receive a bonus roughly equal to 150 days pay.

But workers say that the management has not held up its end of the deal. Over the past year the company has recorded profits of more than LE 200 million, although despite these apparent boom times workers say they have only received a bonus equal to 20 days pay.

They accuse the management of diverting LE 40 million of that profit into private bank accounts, and say that they want the rest of the money they are owed.

“The main problem we have here is that we were promised that if the company made LE 60 million in profit then we would all get paid a bonus out of 10 percent of it,” said one man, who like the other was afraid to give his name.

“The Chairman of the Board told us all that the company made LE 245 million this year, but they only gave us a bonus of 20 days.”

The management of Ghazl El Mahalla refused to comment. When approached by foreign and Egyptian reporters for a response to the worker’s charges, one member of the Board of Directors fled through the streets of Mahalla in a polished Toyota.

After December’s strike, the Mahalla workers movement began a campaign to impeach their local union leaders and abolish the country’s national union body, the General Federation of Trade Unions.

They claim that the General Federation has been co-opted by the Mubarak regime, and is more interested in keeping the regime in power than it is in helping the country’s workers. According to them, what Egypt needs is an independent labor movement.

“We want a change in the structure and hierarchy of the union system in this country,” said Mohamed El Attar, one of the leaders of the workers’ movement.

“The way unions in this country are organized is completely wrong, from top to bottom. It is organized to make it look like our representatives have been elected, when really they are appointed by the government.”

El Attar and seven others were arrested late on Tuesday night and charged with the potentially serious crimes of sabotage, unlawful gathering, the destruction of public property and instigating riots.

But they were released two days later, El Attar says, after police told them that they sympathized with the strike. Their first court session is scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 29.

Speaking to a crowd of hushed workers in the factory’s Talaat Harb Square just before sunset, El Attar urged them not to give up their fight against the factory management and its allies within the government and state security forces.

For him, the Mahalla strike is not just about wages and benefits, but about the future of the country.

“He built this company for the workers and for the people of Egypt,” he told them, gesturing to a nearby statue of Talaat Harb, a national leader who helped forge Egypt’s economy after independence from Britain. “Every grain of sand in this company is yours. He built it for you, and it still belongs to you.”

But the management of Misr Spinning and Weaving disagrees. They say the company belongs to them. The Board of Directors issued a statement on Wednesday declaring that the company is on a week-long holiday and that any workers who remained on the premises were trespassing on company property and would be open to prosecution.

Workers fear that the sudden declaration of a week-long holiday will be used to justify the use of force against them by state security, which they say has sent soldiers to barricade the factory gates during the night.

Each time soldiers approach the factory, workers say they have outnumbered and intimidated them, but the threat of future violence against the Mahalla strikers and their families is real.

“We have to stay here no matter what,” El Attar told the mostly-male crowd on Wednesday. “Even if a worker, or two or 20 are killed. If you leave your places inside this strike, then you are running away from your blood and your manhood.”

Many in the crowd agreed with El Attar.

“We are ready to die to get what is ours,” said one. “We don’t want anything more than that.”

“We just want our rights,” insisted another. “We are ready to die for our rights.”

But a mood of frustration hangs over the tent city at Ghazl El Mahalla, and many workers say they are angry that factory management and government officials are unwilling to negotiate. Four days into the strike, workers say the only times that they have heard from officials is when they make statements to the media.

“There are no government representatives coming here to try to reach a common ground,” said one man. “The government cannot just abandon people like this.”

So far, it seems the government has little interest in finding common ground with the strikers.

On Wednesday night, Minister of Labor Aisha Abdel Hady appeared on El Beit Beitek, a nightly news magazine show on Egyptian Channel 2, and accused the Mahalla workers of sabotaging the factory machinery. But she later called the workers “loyal, honest and honorable people” and said that she would work to ensure their rights.

Residents of the tent city say they are uninterested in Abdel Hady’s compliments, and angrily deny her accusations of sabotage. They say that they would not sabotage the very machines that provide their livelihood.

To demonstrate that no sabotage has taken place, members of the private security team employed by Misr Spinning and Weaving took two Daily News Egypt journalists inside the locked factory to show them that the machines were in working order.

“We are not sabotaging this factory,” growled one gray-haired worker, showing the machinery to visitors as a uniformed member of factory security stood nearby. “We are guarding these machines. This is our factory. This is where we make our living. We understand that.”

Workers say they want a resolution to the strike, but believe that in the end the only person with the authority to meet their demands is President Mubarak. While some workers say they want him to get more involved in the dispute, others say it is time for his rule to end.

That is the position taken by Mohamed El Attar, the influential worker leader. For him, organizing workers, as in the Mahalla movement, is the way forward for Egypt.

“I want the whole government to resign,” he told the crowd standing in Talaat Harb square, just before the end of the Ramadan fast. “I want the Mubarak regime to come to an end.”

“Politics and workers’ rights are inseparable,” he added. “Work is politics by itself. What we are witnessing here right now, this is as democratic as it gets.”

DNE: Eight Mahalla strikers arrested, thousands erect tent city inside factory

Eight Mahalla strikers arrested, thousands erect tent city inside factory

By Liam Stack
First Published: September 25, 2007

CAIRO: Thousands of workers in the Nile Delta town of El Mahalla El Kobra continued their strike for a third day on Tuesday, erecting a tent city in the center of the factory grounds even as three more strike leaders were arrested by state security.

About 27,000 employees of the Misr Spinning and Weaving Company in Mahalla went on strike on Sunday, about 10 months after a previous strike won them increased wages and benefits.

They say that management has not fulfilled the promises it made after that strike, in December, and that none of their gains have been realized. They say wages have remained very low and bonuses they were promised have not been forthcoming.

An original string of arrests on Monday saw workers Mohamed El Attar, Feisal Naqousha, Magdy Sherif, Mohamed Abu El Isaad, Wael Habib taken in to custody. They were charged with a string of potentially serious crimes including sabotage, unlawful gathering, the destruction of public property and instigating riots.

On Tuesday Khattaby Eid, Ahmed Sharaa, Farag Awad, also workers in Ghazl El Mahalla, were detained and charged with the same offenses.

Sources in Mahalla say that they are not intimidated by the arrests. They vow to continue their strike for as long as it takes, and to prove their determination have begun to erect a tent city in compound’s central Talaat Harb Square.

“We are putting up tents inside the factory grounds, and no one is stopping us,” said Gehad Taman, an employee at Misr Spinning and Weaving. “We want to send a message to the management that we are not going anywhere.”

“We are bringing our wives and our children, our whole families, here,” he added. “We will eat and drink and sleep here and will show them that we are not going anywhere. If we have to we will stay here until Eid.”

DNE: Family accuses police of torturing man to death in Fayoum

Family accuses police of torturing man to death in Fayoum

By Liam Stack
First Published: September 24, 2007

CAIRO: The family of Mohamed Gomaa Hassan has accused police in Fayoum of torturing him to death after he passed away over the weekend from injuries sustained under unclear circumstances last month.

According to lawyers of Hassan’s family, he was detained by police and brought to Bandar Fayoum police station after arguing with officers in the street on Aug. 17.

While there, they say, he was beaten severely with shoes and whips by Lt. Col. Osama Gomaa and Captain Moataz Abdel Mongi. His brother found him unconscious on the pavement outside the station and rushed him to Fayoum Public Hospital.

At the hospital, the family was asked to file a police report. Fearing police, they claimed that they did not know what had happened to Hassan, says Taher Aboul Nasr, a lawyer for the family.

After being released from hospital, his health continued to deteriorate and he was brought to a specialist facility in Fayoum’s Mecca Hospital. There they were asked to file a second police report, and at that time claimed he had injured himself when he tripped and fell down the stairs.

At Mecca Hospital he was diagnosed with severe concussion, internal bleeding in his brain, and tearing of the liver and spleen. He remained in the hospital for several weeks and passed away over the weekend.

It was only after his death that Hassan’s family accused police in Fayoum of torture. Representatives of the family say that they were afraid of police reprisals if they filed a complaint against them, and their main concern while Mohamed was sick was paying for his treatment.

Lawyers for the family also say that the officers who tortured Hassan offered to pay for his expensive treatment, which made his family think twice before charging them with a crime.

“When the victim was sent to the hospital, his family did not make any complaints against the police officers because they are very poor,” said lawyer Aboul Nasr. “They thought the case would end safely without any serious problems for anyone and they thought the police officers would pay for his treatment, which they did."

“They never thought he was going to die,” he added. “His death is what brought the case to the surface.”

Aboul Nasr says that the first two police reports filed by the family must be seen in the context of their poverty and fear of authorities.

“They were afraid of the police,” he said.

The prosecutor’s office in Fayoum started an investigation into Hassan’s death, but Aboul Nasr foresees a long battle ahead. He said they have already had trouble moving the case forward.

The forensic examiner’s office in Fayoum issued a preliminary autopsy report for the victim shortly after his death, but the family angrily rejected their findings.

The forensic examiner, who is employed by the state in Fayoum declared that Hassan suffered from “no apparent injuries,” even though he was diagnosed with severe internal injuries by doctors at Mecca Hospital.

Aboul Nasr says the case is additionally complicated because the officers accused of torturing Hassan, Osama Gomaa and Moataz Abdel Mongi, allegedly offered the family a sum of LE 150,000 to drop the case. He says the family refused the money and that it was quickly withdrawn once it was reported to the Fayoum prosecutor’s office.

Hassan’s case has become a morbidly familiar one in Egypt in recent years, say government critics, as more and more stories of men and women tortured and killed in the country’s police stations are revealed.

“Many people have died from torture over the last few months,” said Dr. Magda Adly, the director of the Nadeem Center for the Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence and Torture. “It is a daily occurrence. Every day someone in our country dies or suffers a severe injury due to torture.”

DNE: Kafr El Dawwar workers threaten Tuesday strike in solidarity with Mahalla

Kafr El Dawwar workers threaten Tuesday strike in solidarity with Mahalla

By Liam Stack
First Published: September 24, 2007

CAIRO: Workers in the Nile Delta town of Kafr El Dawwar will go on strike today in solidarity with workers in nearby Ghazl Al Mahalla, according to sources within the labor group Ghazl Kafr El Dawwar Workers for Change.

Thousands of workers at the Ghazl Al Mahalla factory in Mahalla have been on strike since Sunday, staging a sit-in inside the factory. The new strike comes roughly 10 months after another strike involving 27,000 workers forced the management of the state-run factory to make concessions on issues of salaries and benefits.

But Mahalla workers say few of management’s promises have been fulfilled, and that months of negotiations have been fruitless. The mood of frustration appears to be spreading to other industrial sites as well.

“After closely following what is happening to our brothers and comrades from the Mahalla workers, and after all the efforts they did to reach a just settlement with the management, we find there was rightly no other choice in front of them but to strike,” said Kareem El Beheiri, an employee at Ghazl Kafr El
Dawwar and an activist with Ghazl Kafr El Dawwar Workers for Change, in a statement released on the group’s website.

“Diplomacy, delegations and pleas are not going to solve the workers’ problems,” he added.

Like workers in Mahalla, those in Kafr El Dawwar also complain that eight months after they struck a deal with management to end their own strike, the bosses have failed to live up to their end of the deal.

“We also demand that the Kafr El Dawwar management implement the rest of our demands, which they have shelved, including fixing the transportation buses at the factory, improving medical services for the workers, and opening the door for promotions for those have earned diplomas,” said Beheiri on the group’s website, http://egyworkers.blogspot.com .

DNE: National Council for Human Rights condemns conviction of newspaper editors

National Council for Human Rights condemns conviction of newspaper editors

By Liam Stack
First Published: September 20, 2007

CAIRO: The National Council for Human Rights expressed its “distress” this week over the convictions of four newspaper editors on charges of insulting President Hosni Mubarak, his son and the ruling party, and called for the President to fulfill promises made in his 2005 electoral campaign to overturn laws that curtail freedom of expression.

In a statement released to the media, the Council, which is backed by the government, urged President Mubarak to “re-examine laws pertaining to freedom of expression” and to “draft new legislation to allow the free flow and exchange of information.”

It urged the President to consider the “gravity of the negative political impact of these provisions on the freedom of press and expression to the entire process of democratic reform.”

The convictions have landed the editors of some of the country’s most popular independent newspapers in serious legal trouble, and each face steep fines of LE 20,000. The four were Adel Hammouda, of Al-Fajr weekly, Ibrahim Eissa, editor of Al-Dostour daily, Wael Al-Ibrashy, editor of Sout Al-Omah weekly, and Abd Al-Halim Kandil, ex-editor of Al-Karama newspaper.

Lawyers of the four men say they will appeal the convictions, and that they are being punished not for insulting the regime but for airing fair criticisms of the government.

Under a deal reached with the court, the men paid LE 10,000 in bail but will not have to begin their incarceration until the appeals process is complete.

This conviction is separate from another case currently pending against Eissa, who has described the regime as “archaic” and “fascist.” He will be tried in October for spreading what the state calls false information about the president’s health.

In its statement the National Council says that the state must foster “the right environment for independent journalism that will play a positive role in paving the path of democracy.”

Independent observers say that the convictions must be seen as part of the larger crack down on civil society and opposition groups, which has resulted in the arrest of hundreds of members of the Muslim Brotherhood and the forcible closure of active civil rights groups like the Center for Trade Union and Worker Services and the Association for Human Rights and Legal Aid.

Indeed, some say, rather than a detour on the road to reform, the crack down is an indication of the state’s hostility to the path of democracy.

“This is a clear indication that we are seeing the end of the relative openness that began in 2005,” says Hossam Bahgat, the Director of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights.

In light of the case, rights groups on Saturday accused Egypt of curbing press freedom.

Human Rights Watch called on the government to repeal laws that allow authorities to "imprison writers and editors solely for exercising their right to freedom of expression."

Amnesty International called for a review of the press law passed in July 2006 in which publishing offences, such as insulting public officials, carry prison sentences.

"Press freedom does not exist in a country where the state can put you in prison simply for criticizing the president," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch.

"This ruling and the new charges against (Eissa) are incompatible with Egypt's constitution and its commitments under international human rights law, not to mention Egypt's current membership on the UN Human Rights Council," she said.

In comments to the weekly Al-Osboa paper published Saturday, Mubarak defended Egypt's press laws and insisted he was an advocate of press freedom, but within limits.

"I am not against criticism... but there is a difference between constructive criticism which seeks to benefit society and destructive criticism which seeks to undermine society's achievements.... This is not criticism, this is abuse of freedom of the press," he said.

Additional reporting by AFP

DNE: As state closes prominent human rights group, activists fear further crackdown

As State closes prominent human rights group, activists fear further crackdown

By Liam Stack

First Published: September 16, 2007
Photo by Liam Stack

CAIRO: Human rights activists from an array of civil society groups took to the streets of downtown on Sunday to protest what they call the politically motivated shut down of the Association for Human Rights and Legal Aid (AHRLA).

The closure comes after a bureaucratic saga in which the group spent months trying to deflect government accusations that it took money from the United States without receiving permission from the Ministry of Social Solidarity.

Staff lawyers for AHRLA vigorously denied any financial misdeeds, even as representatives of the Interior Ministry swept through their office seizing files and documents.

They say the ministry gave them permission to receive funds from the National Endowment for Democracy, and that when the state first made its accusations in June they provided it with copies of all the relevant paperwork.

“We sent all the necessary documents to the Ministry of Social Solidarity,” said Mohamed Bayoumi, a lawyer for the group. “When we sent them, the Ministry said they would respond after ten days, and we waited for their response for two months. After two months, they told us they were going to close us down.”

“Now that they have seized all of our files and documents, they can really see for themselves that we did not do anything wrong,” he added, pointing out a ministry official walking down the street with a box of papers to a foreign reporter.

Members of AHRLA received notice that the government was considering shutting the group down in late August, but were not told that the decision had been made until Sept. 9.

They say they will appeal the decision before the Administrative Court on Oct. 23, but express little optimism in the future of their association. Instead, says Bayoumi, the current AHRLA legal team plans to reopen as the Group for Human Rights and Legal Aid at a new office located in Cairo’s Tawfiqeyya neighborhood.

“Now we are worried that when the government announces their new amendments to the law on organizations they will say it is illegal for any organization to have the word ‘group’ in its name,” he said with a wry laugh.

Rights activists and opposition leaders say that the AHRLA shut down is an escalation of the crackdown that has been slowly descending on Egypt since the mass arrests at judicial demonstrations in 2006. Over 700 people were arrested over several days during protests in support of greater judicial freedom, a demand to which the state never acquiesced.

Demonstrators were quick to point out that the closure of the legal aid group comes only six months after the closure of the Center for Trade Union and Worker Services, a prolific workers’ rights group that was accused of endangering national security through its advocacy of labor unions independent of state control.

The closure of the AHRLA also comes less than a week after the editors of four independent newspapers, including firebrand newspaperman Ibrahim Eissa, were sentenced to one year jail terms and hit with heavy fines for insulting the ruling National Democratic Party of President Hosni Mubarak.

The four were also convicted of insulting the “symbols” of the party — President Mubarak and his son Gamal, who many opposition figures consider the heir apparent to the presidency.

“This cannot be seen in isolation from the general crackdown that we are witnessing now,” said Hossam Bahgat, the director of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights.

“The beginning of the end was the crackdown on supporters of the judges’ demonstration in the spring of 2006, and now this closure comes at the same time as last week’s attack on independent media,” he added. “This is a clear indication that we are seeing the end of the relative openness that began in 2005.”

Protestors and opposition leaders were united in their belief that AHRLA was innocent of the financial misdeeds it stands accused of, and that it has instead been targeted by the regime for its legal work on behalf of torture victims.

“AHRLA was very outspoken in bringing state security officers closer to criminal trials before the courts,” said Aida Seif El Dawla, a professor at Ain Shams University and member of the Nadeem Center for the Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence and Torture.

“Over the summer they filed charges against state security officer Ashraf Safwat on the murder under torture of Mohamed Abdel Adel,” she said. “Even though he was eventually acquitted, this was the first time since 1986 that a state security officer was referred to criminal court.”

Ultimately, Seif El Dawla believes, it was that historic court case that may have been AHRLA’s undoing.

“They were too loud a voice against torture and the policies of the Interior Ministry,” she said. “The regime does not want to tolerate any criticism of any sort — it is closing NGOs, it is persecuting journalists, it is banning peaceful gatherings. This is the state of emergency in action.”

Noha Atef, the editor of the advocacy website http://www.tortureinegypt.net/, agrees. According to her, the shut down of such a prominent legal aid organization is meant to have a chilling effect on human rights advocacy in Egypt.

“This association is very active and has defended many torture victims, so it is only logical that the government would come after them,” she says.

“The state wants to send a message to other civil society groups — they say ‘this was one of the biggest groups and we can just dissolve it whenever we want.’” she adds “That this can happen to a big organization with a lot of its own lawyers — how do you think normal people who don’t have a team of lawyers with them will feel about standing up against torture?”

Bahgat agrees that the specter of further shut downs, and the shock of seeing one of the most prominent human rights groups shuttered by the state, may be what motivated so many different organizations to come to AHRLA’s aid.

“There is a sense of urgency here. This is an increasingly irritated and autocratic regime that is intent on shutting down any channels for peaceful dissent,” he said, watching as rings of baton-wielding, black-clad riot police encircled a small group of protestors.

“People can tell that something serious is about to happen.”

Tampa Tribune: Mohamed enjoyed upscale Cairo community life

Mohamed enjoyed upscale Cairo community life

Abdel Latif Sherif says his son is innocent of the terror-related charges filed against him in Tampa.

Photo by Liam Stack

By LIAM STACK / Tribune correspondent
Published: September 14, 2007

CAIRO - The Heliopolis Club is an oasis of leafy green calm in the heart of the congested but upscale Cairo suburb of Heliopolis.

The address is one of the city's most elite. It is home to gracious villas with luxury cars parked out front, boutiques that sell Gucci head scarves and the heavily guarded palace of President Hosni Mubarak, who has ruled Egypt with an iron fist since 1981.

It is also home to the family of Ahmed Mohamed, a 26-year-old student at the University of South Florida.

On Aug. 31, Mohamed was indicted in Tampa on federal charges of trying to help terrorists by aiding, teaching and demonstrating the use of an explosive device.

The indictment also charges Mohamed and another USF student, Youssef Megahed, with transporting explosives. Both men are Egyptian citizens – Megahed a permanent, legal U.S. resident and Mohamed visiting on a student visa.

The men were arrested Aug. 4 after a routine South Carolina traffic stop uncovered what sheriffs there say were pipe bombs and bullets in his car trunk.

They were pulled over for speeding about seven miles from the Goose Creek Naval Weapons Station, which houses a military prison for enemy combatants.

Organizations like the Heliopolis Club are an institution in the life of upper-class Egyptians, who can slip inside their gates to escape from the noise and overcrowding of this city of 18 million.

But few are allowed inside those gates. Membership in such social clubs is hereditary, with children inheriting from parents and spouses marrying into them from families less well-connected.

Inside, children run around jungle gyms and teenagers lounge by the pool while their parents mingle over buffet lines or a game of golf or croquet.

To enroll as a new member, a family must fork over a lump sum of $10,000 and pay an annual fee; this in a country where the average annual income hovers around $800.

Family members say Mohamed was a regular at the club. He liked to spend his days splashing around one of its several swimming pools or playing sports with his friends.

In a country where poverty and illiteracy are endemic, his was a life of privilege and comfort.

That elite world of pool parties and croquet games is far from the Tampa jail cell where he now sits, and his family and peers expressed shock and disbelief at the charges against him in the United States.

"I was surprised to hear about him," said Maram Mazen, 22, a law graduate from Cairo University. Mazen is a member of the club and lives nearby, but does not know Ahmed personally.

"There is nothing really missing from our lives here," she said. "Why would someone ever do something like that? He's not poor, so he has no reason to be angry."

Across town lies Ramses Square, the transportation hub of the Egyptian capital.

It is a dense knot of highways, overlapping flyovers and foot bridges, and crisscrossing subway and trolley lines wedged between Cairo's cavernous central train station and a patch of sparse grass.

The square swirls with commuters, vendors hocking knock-off designer shades and small glasses of tea, and screaming taxis and shaky microbuses.

On Thursday, the last day before Ramadan, the square was alive with a mass of people hurrying home from work or going to relatives in the countryside to celebrate the beginning of the holy month.

In the center of the rush sits the squat headquarters of the National Authority for Tunnels, the division of the Ministry of Transportation responsible for the network of subways and underground traffic tunnels that cut beneath the city.

And on the second floor of this building, beneath a portrait of Mubarak flanked by framed verses from the Quran, sits Abdel Latif Sherif, vice chairman of the authority and father of Ahmed Mohamed.

Sherif – whose name has been reported in the United States erroneously as Abdellatif Mohamed – sits behind a large desk lined with telephones that ring incessantly. A phalanx of assistants, secretaries and well-wishers files in to his office with paperwork to be signed, hands to shake, and best wishes for the approaching holiday.

He is a heavyset man who is by turns distraught and angry about his son's predicament in the United States, but he is unfailingly polite. He receives every visitor, wishes everyone who passes a happy holiday and makes sure his secretary keeps a steady stream of Coca-Cola coming for a visiting foreign reporter.

Sherif is the image of a successful, prosperous government official. Throughout his life, he said, he has given his children every opportunity that his connections can provide. The chance for Mohamed to study in America was just one of those opportunities, the fulfillment of what he calls his son's lifelong dream.

"Ahmed was very, very happy to go to America. His dream was always to go to Europe or America and to study for a PhD," Sherif said. "And all of us were happy because he was so happy."

Mohamed loved the United States, his father said. Even though he had lived there a short time he told his family he had made a lot of friends and felt at home in Tampa.

"He liked Florida very much and he was very happy there," Sherif said. "When his mother or I would say to him 'Oh, you are living abroad' he would tell us that he felt like he was living in his own country because he had so many friends there."

In the month since he has been imprisoned, Sherif and his wife have been able to speak to Mohamed once. He sounds well, they say, and he said he has put his faith in God to protect him.

But thanks to his father's connections, Mohamed also has more earthly forces coming to his assistance in prison.

Sherif said he has marshaled those connections to help his son in any way possible.

"I contacted lots of high-ranking people that I know in Cairo and they are doing their best to help us with this matter," he said. "I am in contact with them every day and they are doing more than you can imagine, even as we speak."

Sherif fervently believes his son is innocent of the terror-related charges filed against him in Tampa and says his son has been caught in a mixed-up case of racial profiling.

"They are only saying he is a terrorist because he had a long beard at the time he was arrested, because he did not shave for maybe two or three days before his vacation," he said. "I am sure that he was targeted because of the way that he looks – because he is Arab and wore a long beard."

"If my son looked more like you," he said, staring across his massive desk at a pale, clean-shaven foreign reporter, "then he would not be having any of these problems."

Sherif's confidence in his son's innocence seems to be matched only by his faith in the Egyptian government to bring him home.

"The Egyptian government has helped us so much, especially the Foreign Ministry and Ministry of Higher Education," he said. "They have helped us to speak to him in jail, they are helping us get a lawyer, and they will also pay for the lawyer. The government will never leave him. They will do their best to bring our son home."

In the meantime, Mohamed's Tampa arrest has left a wake of sadness and confusion in his Cairo social circle.

As Egyptian families settle in to a season of religious devotion, family dinners and holiday TV specials after a day of fasting, Mohamed's family said they are depressed, angry and afraid to allow their other son to travel abroad.

"This whole situation is so strange and horrible," Sherif said. "Of course we are suffering, my family is in a very bad state."

Outside the Heliopolis Club, Maram Mazen strikes a similar tone.

"Why would a terrorist ever come from someplace like this?" she said. "For people who are very poor, I understand why they would be angry enough to do something extreme. But for someone like him, it makes no sense."

Liam Stack is a Cairo-based reporter.

DNE: Family of Egyptian charged with terrorism in the US speaks out

Family of Egyptian charged with terrorism in the US speaks out

By Liam Stack
First Published: September 13, 2007

CAIRO: Ahmed Abdel Latif Sherif was a promising student from a well-connected family who spent his days playing sports at the Heliopolis Club, say relatives. He was so bright that as a fresh graduate of Ain Shams University he was hired to teach in its Faculty of Engineering.

He always wanted to study abroad and last year his dream came true when he was awarded a scholarship for graduate study in the United States. But Sherif’s dream has turned into a nightmare, says his family.

He now sits in solitary confinement in a Florida jail cell, accused by the United States government of explosives charges. Rather than teaching engineering, they say, he was giving lessons to would-be terrorists in the construction and detonation of bombs.

Abdel Latif Sherif, Ahmed’s father and the vice chairman of the National Authority for Tunnels, firmly rejects the American government’s charges.

“We are sure that he is innocent and did not do anything bad to anyone in America or to the community he lives in,” Sherif told Daily News Egypt. “These are false charges.”

Ahmed’s troubles began when he and a friend, Egyptian-American Yousef Megahed, were pulled over for speeding on a South Carolina highway on Aug. 4, near a navy base housing weapons facilities.

Ahmed’s family says he and Megahed were taking a vacation to celebrate his twenty-sixth birthday, but according to police they were carrying weapons and an explosive device in their car.

They were detained and charged with possession of explosives in the state of South Carolina, and were then transferred to Tampa, Florida, where they both attend the University of South Florida. There they were charged with transporting explosives across state lines, and Ahmed was additionally charged with teaching the use of an explosive device.

Ahmed’s father says that his son was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, and that the charges against his son are a mixed up case of racial profiling.

“They are only saying he is a terrorist because he had a long beard at the time he was arrested, because he did not shave for maybe two or three days before his vacation, just like any other young man might not shave,” says Sherif.

“I am sure that he was targeted because of the way he looks — because he is Arab and wore a long beard,” he added. “If he was white, and not a little bit colored like he is, then he would not be having any of these problems.”

Sherif and his wife have been able to speak to Ahmed only once in the month that he has been imprisoned in Florida, and say that he sounds well. He fervently believes he is innocent, they say, and has put his faith in God to protect him.

Thanks to his father’s connections as a prominent government official, Ahmed also has more earthly forces coming to his assistance in prison.

Sherif says that a range of officials in ministries across the government, in particular the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Higher Education, are working to help the family.

They arranged for Ahmed to speak with his parents from inside the prison and are going to pay for an American legal team to seek his release.

“I arranged to speak to my son through high level authorities. They are doing more than you can imagine for us,” says Sherif. “They are taking all the necessary actions and are doing their best to help us with this matter.”

“They are doing everything that is required to deal with this subject, even as we speak,” he added. “I am in contact with them daily.”

It is unclear what role his father’s connections may play in Ahmed’s criminal case. As a non-citizen he has few rights in the United States, and as a suspect in a terrorism case he may be afforded even fewer. The maximum penalty for the two charges against him is 30 years in prison.

In the meantime, the Sherif family begins Ramadan under a cloud of uncertainty and worry.

“Our family is living in a very bad situation,” he says. “We are very depressed. We are angry. We are unhappy. We are sure that he is innocent.”

If he is allowed to meet with his son, Sherif says he will go to him right away.

“If I can get an appointment to meet him, then I will go to see Ahmed and how he is being treated in America. I don’t want to go anywhere in this world anymore, I just want to go see my son.”

DNE: MB detainee freed for heart surgery, but most sick prisoners remain in jail

MB detainee freed for heart surgery, but most sick prisoners remain in jail

By Liam Stack
First Published: September 11, 2007

CAIRO: Muslim Brotherhood detainee Dr Sanaa Abu Zeid was released from Tora Prison on Monday night after suffering chest pain.

He was then sent to the intensive care unit at Manial University Hospital where open heart surgery was recommended.

Abu Zeid is the seventh Brotherhood detainee in recent weeks to face serious illness in Tora prison, but one of only two to be released into what friends and associates consider appropriate medical care.

Mahmoud Hussein, who was arrested in a Giza raid on Aug. 17, was released shortly thereafter when he suffered a heart attack inside prison. He was also sent to Manial University Hospital, which has a special ward to treat prisoners and convicts. There he received medical care while handcuffed to a gurney.

Also released to Manial Hospital this week was Hassan Zalat, a defendant in the military trial currently taking place against 40 Muslim Brotherhood leaders on charges of money laundering and membership of a banned organization.

He was also told he needed a bypass operation, but the hospital said it did not have the resources to treat him. When his family requested he be moved to Al Qasr Al Aini hospital, authorities at Tora refused.

“Zalat is supposed to have open heart surgery, but they won’t allow it,” said Ibrahim El Houdaiby, board member of ikhwanweb.com.

“He has been sick for a long time — when they arrested him back in February he had just had a heart operation.”

According to Brotherhood blogger Abdel Moneim Mahmoud, detainees Dr Mohamed Kamal and Dr Mahmoud Doheimy also suffer from heart conditions and may require open heart surgery, but authorities at Tora prison have so far refused to release them.

Zahraa El Shater, daughter of Brotherhood Deputy Khairat El Shater, who is currently standing trial before a military court, says that many Brotherhood family members fear sending their loved ones to Manial Hospital because it has a reputation for poor treatment and unsanitary conditions.

Her father is a diabetic suffering from a potentially dangerous leg infection in jail, but she says that her family has urged him not to go to Manial Hospital.

“The prison hospital is even dirtier and worse than the prison itself,” she said. “We would rather he stay in his cell than be sent to that dirty hospital.”

DNE: Brotherhood military trial reconvenes today amid lingering concerns over detainee health

Brotherhood military trial reconvenes today amid lingering concerns over detainee health

By Liam Stack
First Published: September 11, 2007

CAIRO: The military trial of Muslim Brotherhood leader Khayrat El Shater and 39 others continues today.

Meanwhile, the family says that the state continues to deny proper medical care to several defendants who are in poor health.

According to Brotherhood sources, the presiding judge in the case also refused to open a criminal investigation into the conduct of the state security officers involved in the arrests of the defendants. Fourteen of these officers are the prosecution’s primary witnesses in the case.

Family members of the 40 defendants say that police seized money and valuables from their homes during the arrests, which were ostensibly to be entered into evidence against the men. That was months ago, and so far prosecutors in the case have never seen any of the seized goods.

In the last session chief defense lawyer Abdel Moneim Abdel Maqsud accused the arresting officers of robbery and demanded they be investigated by the prosecutor’s office.

The judge formally refused that request on Sunday, although the Brotherhood legal team asked him to reconsider.

Brotherhood lawyers also asked the judge to consider two motions to improve the quality of life of the defendants and their families. The first would release the defendants into house arrest for the holy month of Ramadan, as was allowed for other high profile defendants before military courts in the past.

The second motion would allow businesses owned by the men to be reopened, ending state-ordered closures that took effect after their detentions.

The judge will respond to all three requests today, but Brotherhood sources say they do not expect him to agree to any of them.

On Sunday, the defense continued its cross examination of the prosecution witnesses, although it says that the security officers testifying for the state refused to answer any questions.

“The police witnesses kept saying their usual answer to every question the defense lawyers asked them. They just kept saying ‘I don’t remember,’ or ‘I can’t say,’ or ‘that is classified information,’” complained Zahraa El Shater, who has been at all 11 sessions of the trial. She is the daughter of Khayrat El Shater and the wife of Ayman Abdel Ghany, who is also standing trial before the military court.

Hassan Zalat, one of the defendants in the case, was not present at Sunday’s session because he is awaiting permission to undergo open heart surgery in the prisoner’s ward of Manial General Hospital.

According to El Shater, Zalat and his family have requested that he be moved to Qasr El Aini Hospital to receive the operation, but the court has overruled the request.

It recommends that he have the surgery in Manial General, which has already said it cannot do it. In addition, Brotherhood sources worry that the hospital is not sanitary enough to be the setting for complicated open heart surgery.

They point to the death of Brotherhood detainee Abdel Rahman Abdel Fattah in the prisoners’ ward in the late 1990s. After being convicted by a military court in 1995 for membership in a banned organization, Abdel Fattah was sentenced to three years in prison.

During that time he developed complications related to diabetes and was sent to Manial General, where Brotherhood sources say he was left unattended for long periods of time without medical attention and eventually died.

DNE: State accuses human rights group of corruption, threatens shut down

State accuses human rights group of corruption, threatens shut down

By Liam Stack
First Published: September 9, 2007

CAIRO: The Association for Human Rights and Legal Aid (AHRLA) has received notice that the governor of Cairo is weighing a decision to close the organization and try its members on corruption charges.

The group’s director says these allegations are fabricated.

The decision appears to have come directly from the desk of Cairo Governor Abdel Azim Wazir, who claims that since its foundation in 1999 AHRLA has illegally raised funds both domestically and abroad without seeking prior approval from the Ministry of Social Solidarity.

The Ministry of Social Solidarity maintains that it is within neither their mandate nor the power of the governor to shut down NGOs, and told Daily News Egypt that this authority rests with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Representatives from the office of Governor Wazir, on the other hand, say that a decision is still pending and that they cannot comment on the case until it has been reached.

Tareq Khater, director of AHRLA, says he learned that a decision on the future of his NGO was pending after reading about it in Al Masry Al Youm last week.

He rejects the accusations of corruption and says this is a politically motivated attack.

“The government wants to close AHRLA because this association works on torture cases,” Khater told Daily News Egypt. “If the governor of Cairo decides to close us down we will continue our work. The government has declared war on NGOs, but they cannot stop us.”

To combat the corruption charges, Khater says that AHRLA will publish a detailed financial statement next week outlining its fund-raising activities and expenditures over the past eight years.

“Since AHRLA was founded in 1999 we have raised around LE 1.3 million, which we have used to fund programs here in Cairo and out of three branch offices in Alexandria, Tanta and Minya,” said Khater.

The potential shut down of AHRLA follows in the footsteps of the closure last winter of the Center for Trade Union and Worker Services (CTUWS), an independent labor rights group that the government claimed was a threat to national security.

Activists say it is more likely that the government felt threatened by the Center’s support of striking workers, many of whom forced state-owned industries to compromise on wages and benefits and called for the resignation of pro-government union officials.

“If you are very active in your field, then the government will come after you,” said Rahma Refaat, the program coordinator at CTUWS. “They are coming after AHRLA now because this organization has been very active against torture, and they came after us last year because we were very active in workers’ rights.”

Members of AHRLA are nervous about the future, and worry that if the state does shut their organization then it will follow through on its threat to open criminal proceedings against them individually on charges of corruption. But they say that the possible closure of another human rights organization only means that rights activists must work together more closely to fend off state accusations.

At the end of the day, they say they believe they are doing the right thing.

“My colleagues and I may not know exactly what to do against the state, but we are confident that we have international law and all of Egypt’s international conventions on our side,” said Khater. “We will complete our work.”

Additional reporting by Khadiga Samir