Counselor Maher `Abd al Wahed
Prosecutor General
Dar al Qada’ al `Ali
Ramsis Street
Cairo, Egypt

Dear Prosecutor General `Abd al Wahed:

Human Rights Watch writes to express our grave concern over the decision of the acting Higher State Security Prosecution Office Attorney General Osama `Abd al-Mon`im Ali on August 7, 2003 to press charges against antiwar activist Ashraf Ibrahim and four other defendants, and to refer their case to a Higher Emergency State Security Court. We are concerned that the charges against Ashraf Ibrahim, Nassir Faruq al-Bihiri, Yahya Fikri Amin Zahra, Mustafa Muhammad al-Basiuni, and Remon Edward Gindi Morgan are meant to punish them for the legitimate exercise of their basic rights to expression, to association, and to receive and share information concerning the defense of human rights and freedoms. We are also extremely concerned that the five defendants will be subjected to a trial, under the terms of Egypt’s emergency legislation, which violates internationally recognized standards of due process.

"We are concerned that the charges against Ashraf Ibrahim, Nassir Faruq al-Bihiri, Yahya Fikri Amin Zahra, Mustafa Muhammad al-Basiuni, and Remon Edward Gindi Morgan are meant to punish them for the legitimate exercise of their basic rights to expression, to association, and to receive and share information concerning the defense of human rights and freedoms."

We urge you to ensure that Ashraf Ibrahim is released without delay, and that the politically-motivated charges against him and the four other defendants are dropped. We make this recommendation out of concern for the consequences of these prosecutions for the exercise of peaceful dissent in Egypt, the inability of the Higher Emergency State Security Court to meet international fair trial standards, and the health and well-being of Ashraf Ibrahim in detention.

Criminalization of Peaceful Dissent
All five defendants have been charged under Article 80 (d) and Article 86 bis of the Penal Code, laws whose breadth and vagueness place most forms of peaceful dissent from government policy under the pall of potential criminality. Their use in this case violates the rights of freedom of expression and assembly1. Specifically, Ibrahim, al-Bihiri, and Zahra are accused of “holding leadership as members of the steering committee of the revolutionary socialists’ group,” while al-Basiuni and Morgan are charged with joining such a group. Ibrahim is also accused of “holding and possessing publications disseminating advocacy and propaganda for the group’s purposes,” and of “sending false information to foreign bodies—foreign human rights organizations—which include, contrary to the truth, violations of human rights within the country, the content of which weakened the position of the state.”

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which Egypt became a party in 1982, guarantees, in its Article 19, the right to freedom of expression, including “freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media.” It guarantees the rights of assembly and association in its Articles 21 and 22. The prosecution of these defendants for their alleged political expression and activity egregiously violates these provisions.

Particularly disturbing is the charge that Ashraf Ibrahim communicated with “foreign human rights organizations.” The right to receive and share information concerning human rights is essential not only to the defense of individual liberties but to the functioning and survival of civil society. The United Nations Declaration on human rights defenders (adopted by the General Assembly in 1999) holds, in its Article 5, that “Everyone has the right, individually and in association with others, at the national and international levels: (a) To meet or assemble peacefully; (b) To form, join and participate in non-governmental organizations, associations or groups; (c) To communicate with non-governmental or intergovernmental organizations.” It also guarantees, under Article 6, the right “to know, seek, obtain, receive and hold information about all human rights and fundamental freedoms;” “ to publish, impart or disseminate to others views, information and knowledge on all human rights and fundamental freedoms”; and “to study, discuss, form and hold opinions on the observance, both in law and in practice, of all human rights and fundamental freedoms and, through these and other appropriate means, to draw public attention to those matters”. The charge against Ashraf Ibrahim flouts all these principles.

The government should immediately halt politically motivated legal proceedings against Ashraf Ibrahim, Nassir Faruq al-Bihiri, Yahya Fikri Amin Zahra, Mustafa Muhammad al-Basiuni, and Remon Edward Gindi Morgan. Their prosecution on these charges violates their fundamental rights to association and expression, and we urge you to ensure that the charges against them, which are based on their exercise of those rights, are dropped.

Unfair Trials
Human Rights Watch is also gravely concerned by the referral of these defendants to a Higher Emergency State Security Court. The system of Emergency State Security Courts--a product of the state of emergency under which Egypt has been governed with only sporadic intermissions since the passage of Law No. 162 of 1958. These courts constitute a parallel judicial system that is highly susceptible to government influence and does not provide for the right to appeal to a higher judicial body. This violates article 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which guarantees every defendant the right to trial before a competent, independent, and impartial court, as well as the right to judicial review of verdicts.

Trying Ashraf Ibrahim and his co-defendants before this court belies recent promises by the by Egyptian officials, including yourself, to improve Egypt’s human rights record and support the independence of the judiciary. It points to the government’s continued determination to persecute and deny due process to political opponents. We urge you to revoke immediately the order transferring these cases to the Higher Emergency State Security Court.

Concerns for the Health and Well-Being of Ashraf Ibrahim
Human Rights Watch is concerned that Ashraf Ibrahim is being held in conditions that endanger his health and well-being. State Security agents raided Ashraf Ibrahim’s home, in his absence, on April 17, 2003, and seized his computer and other electronic equipment and papers, after searching the premises without presenting a warrant. According to one of his attorneys, the warrant ultimately produced in the case file was actually dated April 18. On April 19, Ashraf Ibrahim surrendered himself to State Security Investigations. He has been in detention since, and is now in Mahkoum Tora prison. For over three and one-half months, State Security prosecutors regularly renewed his detention without calling witnesses for questioning or bringing formal charges. During his interrogations, prosecutors reportedly told Ibrahim that he was being investigated for downloading information on human rights from the Internet and downloading material from the website of the al-Jazeera news service.

On July 30, Ashraf Ibrahim began a hunger strike to protest the prolongation of his detention. No doctor visited him for the first five days of his hunger strike; the niyaba, mandated by law to confirm and monitor hunger strikes, did not visit him until the seventh day. During his hunger strike, Ibrahim was reportedly held in an inadequately ventilated and vermin-infested punishment cell, in solitary confinement. While he has reportedly abandoned his hunger strike now that charges have been preferred, Human Rights Watch remains extremely concerned about his state of health. We urge the Prosecution Office to:

• order Ibrahim’s immediate transfer to a facility that can provide him with appropriate medical care;
  
• allow independent medical experts to visit Ibrahim to evaluate his physical and mental condition
  
• ensure that prosecutors conduct regular visits to detainees to monitor detention conditions and investigate complaints.
  

Sincerely,
Joe Stork
Washington Director
Middle East & North Africa Division