APRIL 18, 2005
Posted: May 4, 2005
Abdel Nasser al-Zuheiry, Alaa al-Ghatrifi, and Youssef al-Oumi, Al Masry El Youm
LEGAL ACTION
The Committee to Protect Journalists condemned the sentencing of three Egyptian journalists to one year in prison.
In a Cairo criminal court, Abdel Nasser al-Zuheiry, Alaa al-Ghatrifi, and Youssef al-Oumi, reporters for the independent daily Al Masry El Youm (The Egyptian Today) were found guilty of defaming Egypt's Minister of Housing Mohammed Ibrahim Suleiman in an August 2004 article. The journalists were not present for their sentencing, but could be arrested at any time.
According to Hisham Kassem, the chief executive officer of Al-Masry al-Youm, the article in question alleged that authorities had searched the minister's office and that Suleiman had been temporarily suspended from duty.
The day after the story's publication, the Egyptian cabinet denied that Suleiman's office had been searched or that he had been suspended. Kassem said that the paper published the government's denial, but stood by the story.
About a month after the article's publication, Suleiman took legal action against journalists.
The journalists received the sentences more than a year after Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's call to eliminate criminal penalties in cases of defamation and other press infractions. The Egyptian parliament had not amended the law under which journalists may be sentenced to up to two years in prison for defamation.
MAY 25, 2005
Posted: June 21, 2005
Shaymaa Abol Kheir, Al-Dustour
Gamal Fahmi, Press Syndicate and Al-Arabi
Mohamed Abdel Kouddous, Press Syndicate
Several other journalists
ATTACKED
Government supporters assaulted several foreign and local journalists as police looked on during demonstrations in Cairo.
Journalists told CPJ that the attacks took place as they were covering demonstrations in downtown Cairo organized by Kifaya (Enough), an opposition group that was protesting a referendum to allow only limited presidential elections in Egypt.
Five journalists interviewed by CPJ said that security forces nearby did nothing to impede the several dozen attackers who descended upon the protestors and journalists and began punching, kicking, and slapping them. Some female reporters were groped by the assailants.
Shaymaa Abol Kheir, of the weekly opposition newspaper Al-Dustour, told CPJ that a person she believes to be a security agent stopped the taxi that she and a colleague had entered and forced them out of the car. Abol Kheir said she and her colleague were handed over to female government supporters who beat them, tore their clothes, and groped them.
Gamal Fahmi, a member of the board of the Press Syndicate and contributor to the weekly Al-Arabi, told CPJ that he and Mohamed Abdel Kouddous, another prominent syndicate member, were also pushed and punched in the melee. Other journalists told CPJ that they were punched, kicked, groped, and had their clothing ripped.
JUNE 2005
Posted: June 21, 2005
Shaymaa Abol Kheir, Al-Dustour
Abeer al-Askary Al-Dustour
HARASSED
On May 25, government supporters beat several foreign and local journalists covering a protest over limited presidential elections. Journalists interviewed by CPJ said that Egyptian security forces did not intervene. Journalists said they suspected some of the assailants were actually security agents.
More than a dozen journalists filed complaints with the Prosecutor-General's office against the leadership of Egypt's ruling party and specific officers who were present at the melee. Since that time, CPJ learned, at least two female reporters were pressured by security forces to withdraw their complaints. One journalist, Shaymaa Abol Kheir of the weekly independent newspaper Al-Dustour, who was beaten and groped by female government supporters, told CPJ that security agents have conveyed messages to her through relatives and neighbors. Abol Kheir told CPJ that agents told her neighbors that her brothers would be detained and that she would face legal charges unless she dropped her complaint.
Another journalist who filed a complaint, Abeer al-Askary, also from Al-Dustour, told local journalists that her family received a visit from individuals who identified themselves as General Intelligence agents, warning her and her family that they would face serious consequences unless she dropped her complaint. Journalists who spoke to al-Askary told CPJ that she was informed that her siblings would lose their government jobs and that her parents could be detained. Neither journalist has dropped her complaint.