- EGYPT
- January 2, 2015
- 3 minutes read
Press Coordination Committee: Aljazeera Journalists Must Be Released Along with 90 Other Journalists
The anti-coup journalists and media coordination committee (JMCC) in Egypt said: "After a whole year unjustly spent in junta prisons, the time has come for all to take note of the real violations committed against media freedom, political dissent, freedom of opinion and expression, in Egypt, since the illegitimate July 3, 2013 military coup.
"Muzzling mouths and shuttering media outlets is the most intense now, not to mention the continuing and intensifying campaign of arbitrary arrests which has already jailed150 journalists and media professionals since the coup. Currently, over 90 of those still languish in junta prisons. Many of those suffered methodical abuses, ill-treatment and torture. Most importantly, everyone’s freedom of speech, expression and writing is constantly threatened with prosecution."
Entities affiliated with JMCC in Egypt stress that Thursday’s appeals court order for a retrial of Aljazeera journalists must be the first of many steps that pave the way for the release of all press and media detainees in Egypt. In fact, this court order can by no means justify the detention of these media professionals for over a year and a half. Hence, it can only be a step that requires compensation for incarceration for nothing more than political settling of scores.
JMCC further asserts that: "Recent leaks, followed by the whole world over the past few days, on the Mekammileen (We shall continue) and Al-Sharq satellite TV channels, have demonstrated beyond any doubt that the coup regime, the junta and its leaders are abusing the media. Instead of spreading awareness, broadcasting information and encouraging free thought, the putschists’ use the media as a tool of deceit, manipulation and disinformation, which explains the putschists’ prosecution of free honest journalists, because they do their professional duties objectively, away from the heinous conspiracy against the Egyptian people’s minds, to control their free will.
"We hope for more solidarity and cooperation from free and honest media professionals around the world, in order to defend media freedom – now persecuted in Egypt after the illegitimate military coup."
