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September 24, 2020
CAIRO – Egyptian lawyers say the country’s security forces have made a series of arrests in response to demonstrations on September 20-21 seeking political and economic reforms. The protests took place in response to a call from Spain-based Egyptian contractor Mohamed Ali, who has been a thorn in the government’s side.
Participation in the demonstrations was limited amid increasing government repression. Several neighborhoods in Cairo witnessed demonstrations; There were also protests in other provinces, most of which are rural.
People who witnessed the demonstrations told Al-Monitor that there were calls for the departure of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi; a witness said: “The security forces treated them brutally while firing tear gas canisters to disperse the protests.”
Human rights lawyer Hala Abu Duma told Al-Monitor that she “expects more arrests in the areas that saw protests.” She said: “Until this morning, the security forces continue to come with the detainees to be investigated.”
Abu Duma told Al-Monitor that he was present for the Supreme State Security Prosecutor’s Office interrogations of dozens of detainees on September 20 and 21, saying they were all from poor popular areas or rural villages outside of Cairo, but they were transferred to Cairo after their arrest.
Abu Duma said there were dozens of detainees. “The exact number of detainees cannot be said, but many human rights lawyers, including myself, were there last night with many detainees arrested during the demonstrations until the early hours of September 22,” he said.
Ali, who opposes the Sisi regime, had reiterated his call for the September 20 demonstrations; The date marks the anniversary of the protests that erupted in 2019, when thousands of protesters were arrested and jailed on charges of “belonging to terrorist groups.”
A report released by the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms said that the number of protesters arrested in September 2019 following protests that broke out in several provinces over the course of five days was estimated at more than 4,400. More than 1,439 of them remain in detention.
Human rights lawyer and former presidential candidate Khaled Ali called on human rights lawyers to provide legal support to those detained in recent days. He also posted on his Facebook page a list of the 25 detainees with whom he was present for interrogations.
Khaled Ali told Al-Monitor by phone: “The prosecution questioned many of the protesters who were arrested and decided to keep them in detention for 15 days as a precautionary measure, pending charges of demonstrating, joining a terrorist group and spreading the word. fake news. and damaging Egyptian national security. ”
He added: “There are many human rights lawyers in the … [prosecution] headquarters awaiting the arrival of new detainees from different provinces ”.
Security forces were deployed to vital areas across the country ahead of the September 20-21 demonstrations, shutting down all cafes in the vicinity of the capital Cairo and surrounding major squares. The forces arrested citizens and searched them and their phones in violation of the law and the constitution, observers said.
A human rights lawyer told Al-Monitor, on condition of anonymity, that security forces have embarked on a new pattern of arrests by deploying security personnel among protesters to photograph them and then arrest them at their homes.
The human rights lawyer added: “I attended the interrogation with four people, all detained in their homes, who were assaulted by the security forces. It is as if the message that the security forces wanted to convey is that any protester will be arrested and jailed even if it is not during the demonstration itself. “
Muhammad Ayoub, 45, a restaurant owner in the Basateen area of Cairo, who witnessed continuous demonstrations, told Al-Monitor that the security forces have been arresting citizens at random and that one of their workers he was arrested while passing by on the street. . The worker, he said, “was only released after I contacted the responsible field officer and assured him that he works for us and that he was only in the area for the good of the work, not for the act of demonstrating.”
Ahmed Aboul Fotouh, a human rights lawyer in Alexandria governorate, located about 220 kilometers (135 miles) north of Cairo, told Al-Monitor that security forces “have re-arrested some citizens who were arrested last year on September 20, 2019, demonstrations. “
Aboul Fotouh added: “I was surprised by the multiple calls I received from the families of the detainees I worked with last year. All said that the place of detention of their relatives has not yet been revealed.
He said he advised the families of the detainees to file complaints with the Egyptian prosecutor and the National Human Rights Council about the enforced disappearance of their relatives.
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