Diaries of Torture – March 2010

This month the Association for Freedom and Expression observed an escalation in violence by security personnel and of arrest campaigns against Egyptian university students and their families. During the period of February 24th – April 15th 2010, the Association observed a massive number of student arrests, resulting in the incarceration of approximately 70 students.  Some of these students were kept in detention for a period of four days; others had their incarceration renewed for a period of fifteen days after the initial four-day period.  Summons were also issued for 11 engineering students from Munifiya University, and there were 50 cases of students subjected to investigation and referred to disciplinary boards.  These cases resulted in suspension of the students from university for periods varying between one week to two months, and to the permanent dismissal of four students from their university (University of Fayyoum).  A number of students sustained injuries as a result of the security apparatuses’ intrusion of Egyptian university campuses.  Students were subjected to persecution by security personnel at the following universities: Alexandria University; Munifiya University; Al-Azhar; and Monsoura, Zaqaziq, and Ain Shams universities.

These attacks by security personnel resulted in the detention and imprisonment of 70 students, the investigation of 30 students, temporary suspension of 13 students for a period of two weeks, the permanent dismissal of 12 students from their universities, and four cases being transferred to disciplinary boards.  Finally, seizure and summons orders were issued for 11 students from the Menouf engineering department.

2 March
Escalation of attack on bloggers. An urgent military court for a 20 years old blogger after a three day hearing.

5 March
Tens of family members of detainees in Abu Zaabal prison organized a protest today in front of the office of the public prosecutor protesting the detention of their children with no charge and their torture in prison. They said that their relatives have been subjected to torture and maltreatment, that the prison administration has cut electricity and water, treats them in an inhumane manner and locked them up in their wards for q whole month preventing them from an outdoor break. They also said that prison sergeants and officers used dogs to terrorize them, especially in high security ward no. 1.

March 6

Nine persons were arrested on the accusation that they belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood (Burg al-Arab Prison).

7 March
Release of Ahmed Mostafa

7 March
Testimony of a final year student in the institute of linguistics:

On the 31st of January 2010 a huge police force from Madinet Nasr I police station, about 10 people led by a senior officer broke into our apartment and verbally abused my mother. Some fo them surrounded me and they punched me just because I asked them what they wanted. Later it turned out this was about a quarrel between my brother and an influential person in the neighborhood. I was arrested together with my younger brother Mohamed, student at third year faculty of law and my older brother. We were taken to the 10th district police center. I was handcuffed to my younger brother and while we were walking we were beaten in front of everybody. We then arrived at the police station and the brutal torture began. We were made to sand in front of the canteen and the officer put a knife on the stove until it was red hot. He then asked my older brother to sign documents which he had prepared in advance. My brother refused so the officer ordered his assistants to beat my younger brother and I brutally until we fell to the ground, upon which he started kicking us in the face and head in an attempt to force my older brother to sign. The beating continued and then the officer got that heated knife and repeatedly burnt my left arm until it was totally disfigured. It was then that my brother decided to sign.

8 March
Security forces use thugs and plainclothes police to prevent the gathering of a conference on constitutional changes and democratic reform in Fayoum.

Nine persons were arrested in Sharqaya on the accusation that they belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood (Damanhour al-Amumy Prison).

9 March
Security forces kidnap Dr. Taha Abdel Tawab, physiotherapist in Fayoum governorate. They torture him, strip him of his clothes and threaten to kill him or fabricate a case against him if he does not stop supporting el Baradei and collecting signatures in his support. He was later thrown in the street in a terrible condition.

10 March
Dr. Taha’s health deteriorates in the hospital in view of his hunger strike protesting police aggression against him in the SSI headquarters in Fayoum. SSI pressures Dr. Taha to end his hunger strike.

10 March
Execution of Jihan Ali in Qanater women prison for being charged of murder. The Execution took place without informing her family. Amnesty appeals to President Hosni Mubarak to stop the execution by hanging of Atef Rohayyem Abdel Rohayyem charged of collaboration with Jihan, especially since she confessed while in prison that she committed the crime alone.

11 March
Dr. Taha continues his hunger strike at Senures central hospital protesting his torture by SSI officer Mohamed Abdel Tawak who detained Dr. Taha for 12 hours during which he was stripped of his clothes and beaten because of his support of El Baradei. Dr. Taha’s health condition continues to deteriorate after three days of hunger strike during which he refused the fluids prescribed by the hospital.

11 March
Blogger Wael Abbas sentenced again in a case from which he was acquitted a few weeks ago. Blogger Abbas is charged of providing communication services to the public without permit from competent authorities. It is the same charge that was rejected by the court in an earlier session. The sentence is 6 months imprisonment of a 500 LE fine.

12 March
An informer of the Raswa district in Port Said suspected child Mostafa Sadawi for being a smuggler and shot him causing spinal cord injury and paralysis. Dr. Khalil Ali Khalil, director of El Ismailia said: “Mustafa can be discharged now since we have done all we can. His case is complicated and I do not want to say it is hopeless”. He continued: “We dealt with the case in all transparency and I have informed his family that his stay in hospital will not be of any use since his injury is critical.” Mustafa’s father appealed to human rights organizations to help him redress Mustafa as well as investigate the shooting. Several eye witnesses told the prosecution of Ismailia that Mustafa was returning home from a private lesson and that he has no history of smuggling.

Multiple Muslim Brotherhood arrests:

• Fifteen persons from Giza governorate were arrested on the accusation that they belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood (Burg al-Arab Prison).
• Nine persons from Munifiya governorate were arrested on the accusation that they belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood (Damanhour al-Amumy Prison).

• Nine persons from Sharqaya were arrested on the accusation that they belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood (Wadi al-Natrun Prison 2).
• Nine persons from Daqahliya governorate, five from Qanatar East, five from Ismailaya, three from Abu Sir, one from Al-Tel al-Kabir, and one from Qasasin were arrested on the accusation that they belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood (Damanhour al-Amumy Prison).

13 March
Electrician Omar Abd Rabbo (39 years old) accuses chief intelligence at Gamaleyya police station of torturing and sexually molesting him inside the police station for refusing to work as an informer. When he refused the officer ordered a while and aggressed him as well as sexually assaulted him.

13 March
Officer Mohamed Abdel Tawab of SSI accused of torture and humiliation of Dr. Taha Abdel Tawab ignores the order of the general prosecution in Fayoum to submit himself for interrogation.

14 March
Security forces attack a peaceful rally by 400 persons with disability in front of the headquarters of Cairo governorate. The protestors were demanding the stepping down of Abdel Azim Wazir governor of Cairo for not complying with their request for permits for kiosks and residence, to which they are entitled within the 58% quota specified for people with disability. Central security forces surrounded the demonstrators to prevent them from reaching the republican palace in Abdin. Several of them were brutally beaten by clubs.

15 March
Arab network for human rights information said today that there are clear and strong indicators that the Fayoum officer accused of torture of Dr. Taha Abdel Tawab will probably enjoy impunity as evidenced by the denial of the ministry of interior at first that it had summoned or tortured Dr. Abdel Tawab and the later confession of the ministry that it had summoned the physiotherapist to advise him. The ministry also hinted to the doctor’s affiliation to the Muslim Brotherhood in an attempt to discourage supporters, as if torture is permissible against members of the Brotherhood.

15 March
Amnesty International was informed that a man who is believed to have been wrongly convicted of murder was executed in Cairo on Wednesday morning. Atef Rohayyem Abdel Aal was executed by hanging in the prison of appeal. His family was not informed of his execution and later told to come for his body. It was said the interrogation of Atef took place in the absence of a lawyer and that he has been subject to torture and maltreatment in the presence of witnesses who have been not summoned to testify in court.

15 March
A student and her sister (Alaa and Marwa Mohamed Ibrahim Shehata, 19 and 23 years old) accuse Darb Negam intelligence officer of torture and fabrication of murder charges against their brother Ibrahim (37 years old). The two sisters filed a complaint to the public prosecution stating that one of them had been tortured and held in Darb Negm police station for three days. They added that the police fabricated charges of murder of a driver against their older brother on grounds of a relationship between the deceased and one of the sisters. The younger sister accused intelligence forces of beating her and threatening her with rape, which forced her brother to falsely confess to having committed the crime.

15 March
Policeman attacks a citizen in Manufeyya resulting in coma.

A police sergeant from Menufeyya aggressed a citizen from Menufeyya in view of the latter’s refusal to show him his ID for fear of being later for his train. As a result the sergeant beat him, slapped him and kicked him until he lost consciousness, upon which the citizen was transferred to Sadat general hospital. The case is being investigated.

March 15

Seventeen persons from Alexandria governorate were arrested on the accusation that they belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood (Burg al-Arab Prison).

16 March
University security aggresses 6 female students in Zagazig. Mohamed Hussein Kotb, member of the security force at El Azhar university aggressed 6 female students from the Faculty of fundamentals of religion, Zagazig branch. He tried to pull away their scarves suspecting them to be members of the Muslim Brotherhood. One of the students said that the security guard stopped them at the gate of the faculty, raised his shoe in their faces and threatened to beat them if they came to the faculty again. He verbally abused them and ordered a personal search, upon which a female employee of students affairs tried to tear their veils away and almost tore their clothes in her attempt to rapidly execute the orders of the officer. The students were threatened with expulsion if they did not submit to the orders and abstained from attending college.

18 March
Security forces today broke into the residence of Ahmed Mohamed El Khadl, member of the MB in the city of Rashid, El Beheira governorate. The force broke the door of his flat, destroyed several of the furniture and his belongings, searched the house, confiscated several of his personal items, and arrested him and four of his guests and took them to state security headquarters in Rashid.

20 March
Association of freedom of thought and expression expressed its great concern regarding police aggression against Maha Magdi El Khadrawi, which is an example of the many security violations against students of Egyptian universities. A number of SSI personnel broke into the resident of the student (4th year, Faculty of commerce, Ain Shams University) who is member of the alliance of Egypt’s students. Since she was not at home, the police aggressed her mother resulting in fracture of her arm in addition to beating on the head of her younger brother. The police force searched the room of the student and took a large number of her books, papers in addition to her personal computer. The mother was threatened that her daughter will be detained no matter where she is. The student says that on that day she was at her faculty collecting signatures from her colleagues on a petition that calls for constitutional amendments and improvement of the conditions for presidential nomination. She believes that this is the reason behind the search of her home.

20 March
Defendants in the case of El Zeitoun cell expose physical signs of their torture in front of the judge who orders their examination by forensic authorities.

21 March
A citizen begins a hunger strike in the general Meniet el Nasr hospital in Dakahleyya governorate after he failed to see his daughter since she was taken to work as a domestic worker in the house of a former police general. The young girl’s brother said: My father began a hunger strike after retired police general El Said El Dessouki took my little sister to work as a servant in his house. She was then 8 years old in 1998. he pressured my mother and father to take her and when we asked him to let her go or permit us to see her he refused until this very day, when she is now 19. In the meantime my mother fell ill with a stroke and was kept at the hospital and when I went to the general to ask him to let my sister come and see my mother before she dies he refused. My mother died and since then we have filed more than one complaint against this general, all to no avail.

22 March
Security forces today kidnapped MB member engineer Khaled Saad when he was leaving his work on his way home. The kidnap was witnessed by several of his colleagues. His whereabouts remain unknown and he did not as yet present to the prosecution. Three days ago seven other members of the MB were arrested, received a detention order of 15 days and transferred to Wadi El Natroun prison. The arrests followed activities in support of El Aqsa mosque in Palestine.

22 March
Arrest of a Ibrahim Ghoneim, member of MB in Kom Hamada. The prosecution orders his detention for 15 days.

23 March
Arab network for human rights information condemns the detention of student Ibrahim Megahed, 18 years old, because of a wall journal he wrote in the technical institute – Quesna, Menufeyya governorate where he studied. Last week witnessed also the kidnapping of three other students from n front of the faculty of engineering. Their whereabouts remain unknown.

23 March
A person with a disability illegally detained for three weeks in El Mansoura police station.

A fight between the brother of Mesbah Mohamed El Shahat and an NDP official in El Mansoura results in the arrest of Mesbah, his mother and father, both above 60 years of age and accusing them of false charges. Despite court release intelligence officers at Mansoura police station continue to detain Mesbah, who has Down syndrome.

24 March
Human rights organizations and freedom committees condemn the 23rd of March detentions: 45 members of the Muslim Brotherhood, five students from Al Azhar University. Human rights organizations predict that the detentions are in preparation of some event which the government wants to ensure will pass without protests.

24 March
El Zeitoun intelligence arrested Karim Reda, known as Karim Kovo, one of the administrators of “Enough Torture” on Facebook. After his arrest Karim made an SOS call to Dr. Mustafa Hussein, psychiatrist at El Nadim Center and said he was arrested by the intelligence officers at Zeitoun police station. The line was then cut when the officer prevented him from talking. Activists went to the police station where the chief of police denied having him in his custody. Conflicting information reached his friends that he was taken to state security intelligence and that he is being questioned by the prosecution. His family sent telegrams to the public prosecutor, the minister of interior and the Cairo security directorate asking about his whereabouts. Karim is an internet activists. He moderates the group Enough torture” which publishes police violations and testimonies of torture. Karim had been receiving repeated threats of detention.

25 March
An Egyptian American, suffering a mental disorder dies in Heliopolis police station. The prosecution refuses to permit his burial and orders an autopsy to identify the reason of death after suspecting negligence that led to the death. The events began last Saturday when a police officer in Heliopolis police station arrested Ahmed Assem, in his forties and graduate from the faculty of economics and political science at the AUC. Ahmed was standing in front of the building where he lives. He was in a state of confusion upon which he was taken to be drunk, arrested and held at the Heliopolis police station to stay there for three days, after which his father was informed of his death inside his cell. A family member who took care of the patient said that he had suffered a depressive illness; that he was known to everybody in the neighborhood including police station personnel and that they frequently mocked him. She added that they knew he wa suffering insulin dependent diabetes and could not manage without his insulin injections which he carried on him all the time. She said that we did not find the injections on him when we received the body and that they are awaiting the medical report to confirm whether or not he died of diabetic coma. One of the neighbors testified that he had witnessed the arrest, that they tried to explain to the police that the deceased suffered a psychiatric condition, and that his father is an old and disabled man. All the same the police refused to release Ahmed or allow any of his neighbors, who followed him to the station, to take him home. When he died the police station called those same neighbors to come and take the body.

25 March
Security authorities arrested student Tarek Mohamed Mahmoud Khedr, student at the faculty of science, Alexandria University from campus. No reasons were given for his arrest. His lawyers were denied information regarding his whereabouts.

25 March
A large number of lawyers were aggressed today upon their arrival at the lawyers’ club in Maadi where a mock trial was organized for the ruling party. The event was organized by the Liberties committee at the Bar Association. Arriving at the club the lawyers found it closed and when they forced themselves in they found the grounds of the club covered with water. The electricity was cut as well. They decided to proceed with the event on the pavement opposite the club. In the middle of the second intervention the group was surrounded by police forces who aggressed the lawyers, broke the chairs and tables and physically forced the lawyers into the club and locked them up. A complaint was filed at the office of the public prosecutor.

25 March
SSI officer Ahmed Ezz El Zayat verbally and psychologically aggressed the wife of Mr. Mohamed el Sharkawy (accountant) and his children. He tried to forcefully seize the jewelry she was wearing, when the children began screaming and sought the help of their neighbors. He also stole a sum of 2700 pounds which he put in his pockets and did not record among the items he confiscated from the house. Mrs. EL Zayat was also verbally abused, her veil torn from her head and threatened with sexual assault. A complaint was made to the prosecution.

26 March
Arrest of Hamdi Taha, correspondent with several newspapers and members of the committee in solidarity with the Palestinian people in Aswan, which had organized several events including organizations of seminars and a solidarity convoy to Gaza. Taha and three others were questioned this morning by state security prosecution of Aswan and their detention extended for 15 days.

27 March
Egyptian police shot dead two Eritreans (31 and 33 years old) on Saturday as the would-be migrants tried to cross the border illegally into Israel, a security official told AFP. Four people were also wounded during the shooting, including one who was in a critical condition, and was transferred to Arish Hospital in North Sinai, and another person was arrested.

27 March
Testimony of Karim Kovo after his release.

I was talking to one of the workers at the Petrotrade company (where Karim used to work) when I was suddenly restrained and kidnapped from the street. I was forcefully pulled away amidst verbal abuses and insults. They almost broke my arm trying to get information regarding the coming workers strike. They confiscated my mobile and copied from my phonebook. When the police arrived on site they took me in a police car to El Zeitoun police station. They searched me in a humiliating manner and forced me to take off my trousers while all the time shouting obscenities. I was put in a cell with a large number of detainees who told me terrible stories of their torture in this place.  Next morning they transferred me to Zeitoun prosecution where I received a release order. They then took me to state security headquarters in Lazoughli where I was blindfolded and again subject to verbal obscenities. They threatened to beat and torture me if I did not give them information. They asked about my role in the strike and if I was inciting it. Two intelligence officers interrogated me: one playing the decent role, advising me to collaborate to be able to settle down and promised me a good job position. The other took the harsh approach, abusive, vulgar and threatening with detention. I was returned to the police station and began a hunger strike protesting my illegal detention. Later I was released and learned that my colleagues had organized a protest at the court house.

28 March
SOS by Mrs. Mosbah El Sayed Mohamed el Shahat: my disabled husband is being kept by intelligence officers at Mansoura police station despite his acquittal from charges fabricated by the intelligence officers at the police station. My husband has been kept there for ten days now, although his name is not registered in the station records. My husband cannot walk. He needs special care since he suffers paralysis of both lower limbs in addition to several ulcers in the esophagus, stomach and duodenum.  He is the only breadwinner of our family, my three children and myself.

28 March
this evening security forces broke into the office of Ashraf Wagdi and detained him for unknown reasons. Dr. Wagdy, a psychiatrist, is founder of a progressive internet group in support of El Baradei and one of his strong supporters in his call for constitutional change.

30 March
State security forces today detained Mohamed el Medani, correspondent of Nahdet Misr newspaper in Alexandria in addition to two members of El Shehab center for human rights (Islam Refai and Sohaid Ragab) in addition to Ahmed El Khadal. The arrest took place from the residence of the latter in Rashid.

30 March
An asylum seeker from Eritrea was killed today during his attempt to cross the borders to Israel. He is thereby the third asylum seeker to be killed at the borders within three days, according to an Egyptian security official. The young man, 26 years old, was shot by the police in central Sinai, and two other Eritreans were injured, one in his thigh and the other in his arm according to the same source (EL Masry El Yom).

30 March
In a major challenge to the orders of the prosecution of their release, the ministry of interior issued detention orders for Amin Ramadan, Dr. Amin Qabil, Motaz Bellah Abou Zeid, Dr. Abdel Latif Nosseir and Shaban Abul Kheir and transferred them to Damanhour prison.

31 March
Dahaya center for human rights, Sawaseya center, Misrioun movement, and the Shehab center for human rights issued a statement condemning the detention by SSI officer Ali Rizk in Rashid of Islam Refai Ahmed, director of programs at Shehab center for human rights, his assistant Sohaib Ragab, and Mohamed Medani Nahdet Misr newspaper correspondent. The detention took place while the three of them were documenting a torture case in Beheira.

31 March
Police beats villager in Menya to death.

Villagers in one of the villages of Menya said that the police beat a relative of theirs to death. Fadl Abdallah Mohamed Hassanein (44 years) died in the police station of the city of Deir Mowas hors after his forceful arrest from his house in the village of Ezab El Tall. His brother told Reuters that the police started beating him while still at home because he refused to go with them without knowing the reason for his arrest. The brother accuses Mohamed Sobhi, assistant intelligence officer, and informers at the police station of aggressing his brother, beating him at home and further which eventually led to his death at the police station. Inmates at the police station said the police force kicked Fadly in the back of his head, upon which he began to bleed from his nose. Dr. Mostafa Abd Rabbo, director of Deir Moas general hospital said Fadl was dead when he arrived at hospital. The body was kept in the morgue by the authority of the public prosecution. (ELMasry El Youm, 1/4/2010)

March 31

Forty-five buses from a private transportation company in Sharqaya governorate, carrying 110 people on strike from the company at which they were employed, were gathered and detained.  The employees were protesting a police officer’s assault on one of their colleagues.  The officer had beaten him, cursed him, and fabricated a weapons case against him.  One of the drivers on strike stated that the police officers insulted them and treated them like criminals, despite the fact that many of them had advanced qualifications.  Mohammed, a conductor, added: “We were at a coffee shop in Nakariya, in the center of Zaqaziq, which was frequented by both private and public transportation drivers, as it was close to their lot.  Gasser Zidan, an officer and chief of Central Security Investigations, suddenly assailed the coffee shop.  He beat us repeatedly and swore obscenities at us; at the same time, the coffee shop owner’s brother was arrested.”  Hassan Raghab, one of the drivers who was assaulted, said, “I was eating breakfast at the coffee shop when suddenly a police officer began hitting the table and cursing at us.  He ordered some intelligence officers to investigate us.  When I asked what was happening, the officer slapped me on my face and some soldiers dragged me to the ‘box’, shouting curses at my father.”