Egypt abuses emergency law with the illegal detention and torture of student Ibrahim Mogahed

Egypt abuses emergency law with the illegal detention and torture  of student Ibrahim Mogahed

 The report of Martin Scheinin, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms while Countering Terrorism, said Egypt’s Emergency Law is often applied in situations where there is no link to terrorist activities, such as the frequent arbitrary detention of political activists and bloggers and the repeated use of military courts and state security courts in politically motivated cases. This is extremely practiced against members of the popular Muslim Brotherhood movement.

 

The report highlighted that administrative detention orders repeated by the judiciary in Egypt are often “renewed immediately upon a person’s release or, in the worst case, just ignored through unacknowledged detention until a new order of official administrative detention is obtained.”

This was the case in the arrest of Ibrahim Mogahed, a 20-year-old art student from Damanhur who was arrested on March 11, handcuffed and beaten by the Quesna University’s guards simply for hanging posters and banners  advocating solidarity with the Palestinian cause and Aqsa Mosque.

He was later transferred to Quesna Police Station where he was tortured, threatened and beaten again by police officers from the investigations section in the police station.
He was then presented before Quesna Prosecution which ordered his release after charging him with possessing posters supporting al-Aqsa mosque and belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood, however the Ministry of Interior disregarded the decision of the prosecution and sent him to the headquarters of the State Security Investigations in Shebin el-Kom city where an arrest warrant was issued for him.
On March 13, he was deported to Damanhur Prison without undergoing a medical check-up or treatment after being tortured. Mogahed was denied help from lawyers
It should be stressed that the Emergency Law has recently been used widely against university students, despite the allegations of the Egyptian authorities that the Emergency Law is made for criminals and drugs traffickers.
Torture is still ongoing in police stations and headquarters of the State Security Services against Egyptian citizens.
What happened to Ibrahim Mogahed and many more detainees illustrates the deteriorating situations of human rights in Egypt and is  proof of the arbitrary detentions phenomenon of members of the Muslim Brotherhood where not only leaders and members nominated in the parliament are targetted, but also university students who according to law are still juveniles who must not be treated with cruelty.