32,000 Muslim Brothers Detained Under Old Regime Emergency Law

In a press statement on Friday June 1, Abdel-Moneim Abdel Maksoud, the Muslim Brotherhood’s lawyer, affirmed that the repression suffered by the group during the reign of deposed President Hosni Mubarak put 32,000 innocent Brothers behind bars.

“Mubarak vindictively ignored or over-ruled more than 62,000 court rulings that were in favor of the Muslim Brotherhood and its honorable members.

Abdel-Maksoud pointed that these rulings were for acquittal or release of accused members of the Brotherhood, but were not implemented.

Some ignored or aggressively evaded verdicts were against the exclusion of Brotherhood candidates from all elections that took place in Egypt – from the People’s Assembly to the Shura Council (the two houses of Egyptian Parliament), through local councils and others.

Further, some of these totally ignored rulings were issued in favor of students who belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood – against various government authorities unfairly expelling them from universities, to allow their nomination as candidates in elections, to support their rights to housing in university dormitories or residence halls, while some verdicts were issued to lift travel bans off Brotherhood leaders.

Abdel Maksoud explained that ignoring such verdicts resulted in shutting down more than 1400 companies owned by members of the Muslim Brotherhood, in violation of the constitutional principles that safeguarded citizens’ private property.

Naturally, that resulted in significant economic losses for the individual Brothers concerned and the country itself, as investors preparing to put their money in projects in Egypt just turned away, which undermined the chances of Egypt to attract foreign investment.

Moreover, the Brotherhood’s lawyer said, "In addition to the companies which were shut down, more than 800 cars were confiscated and destroyed through criminal negligence.

A Brother’s arrest usually meant more than depriving him of his freedom; it meant the loss of his job or business, and confiscation of his possessions including his car.

Under the Mubarak regime, more than 44,000 Muslim Brotherhood students were the regular victims of violations of all kinds, including arrests, expulsion, exclusion from student unions elections, brutal interrogation, and exclusion from housing in university dormitories or residence halls – all for their affiliation to the Muslim Brotherhood or for simply expressing their views.

Furthermore, Abdel-Maksoud added that: “During the reign of Mubarak, also, 3200 Brotherhood leaders were banned from traveling, 11000 Brothers were forced to leave their work in various jobs, and all Muslim Brothers were unlawfully prevented from performing the compulsory military service, which was sought by the Muslim Brothers, at the time when all others were evading the service.

“More seriously, thousands of Muslim Brothers were subjected to torture at the hands of Mubarak’s goons in the now-dissolved State Security Investigation apparatus. Such torture claimed the lives of quite a sizeable number of them, like Kamal Alsananiry, Mossad Qutb and Akram Al-Zuhairi.