In February 2020, as he arrived back in Cairo to visit family, Patrick Zaky, a Masters student at Bologna University, was arrested by Egyptian authorities. Zaky, a researcher of gender rights for the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), was detained on charges including “spreading false news” and “an incitement to protest”. His lawyer, Wael Ghally, claimed he was “beaten and tortured”. Ten months on, he is still being held in prison, awaiting his pre-trial hearing.
Then, after a meeting with 13 European ambassadors and diplomats on the state of human rights in Egypt, three more of EIPR’s staff were arrested between 15 and 19 November. EIPR’s administrative manager, Mohamed Basheer, its executive director, Gasser Abdel Razek, and its criminal justice director, Karim Ennarah, were accused of “terrorism” and “spreading false news”.
Their treatment appears to be punitive. They were placed in solitary confinement in Tora Liman maximum security prison, with no contact with the outside world. Basheer was also denied contact with his lawyers: his detention was renewed in secret, three days before the scheduled hearing. Abdel Razek was forcibly shaven, left without heating or winter clothes, and forced to sleep on a cold metal plank without a blanket. Each was added to Case 855/2020, which includes many prominent human rights defenders, journalists and academics such as Mohamed Al Baqer, Mahinour Al Masry, Islam Mohamed, Solafa Magdy and Hazem Hosny.
