The following is an abbreviated translation from some of the Egyptian Arabic-language blogsphere.
It's been more than two weeks since the detention of Alaa along with many other bloggers and activists. Today we came to know about some good news related to some other detained Egyptian bloggers.
Two bloggers were released…
Malek and Mohammed; the two bloggers who were arrested and detained a month ago during a peaceful protest in support of two senior judges, Mahmoud Mekki and Hisham Bastawisi, are now free, or so it appears.
Gharbeia blog reports:
أمرت نيابة أمن الدولة بالإفراج عن مالك مصطفى، ومحمد عادل، وأكرم الإيراني، ومحمد فوزي، ومحمد عبد اللطيف. هم الآن في الطريق العودة إلى سجن طرة، وكما تم مع من أفرج عنهم منذ يومين، قد ينقلون بين عدد من الأقسام، وربما أمن الدولة، وفي الغالب يفرج عنهم بعدها من محال إقامتهم.
State Security Prosecution ordered the release of
Malek Mustafa,
Mohammad Adel, Akram Alirani, Mohammed Fawzi and Mohammad Abdul Latif. They are now on their way back to Tora prison, and as with who were released two days ago, maybe they will be transferred between a number of police departments, and possibly to the Security of the State, as usually might be released from a place near to their residence.
On the other hand, speaking of the political reform in Egypt and the judges case, last week, Judge Mekki was declared innocent, Judge Bastawisi got a repremeditation, but will still have his job. The disciplinary panel was a result for speaking out against election irregularities.
According to Zamakan blog, it seems that some bloggers now feel that the disciplinary panel and the whole case was faked and it was a planed setup between the Government and Judges:
يَسري في المدونات و بالتأكيد في المجالس غيرها ما يصب في اتجاه أن أن القضاة باعوا القضية بمجرد انتهاء مجلس التأديب الهزلي؛ و عن صفقات بين القضاة و الحكومة!
Zamakan don't agree with these claims:
لا تحملوا القضاة فوق طاقتهم. فنحن و هم نريد القضاء مستقلا لأنه حق لنا، و ليس مطلوبا منهم أن يكونوا طرفا في خصومة غير ما يتعلق باستقلال مؤسستهم و سلامة أشخاصهم، و هم قادرون على هذا، و تزيد قدرتهم عليه بتضامنن
Don't bore the judges. We and they want an independent judiciary because it is our right, and they are not required to be a party of the opponents unless it affects the independence and integrity of their organization and safety of the judges, and they are capable of doing this, and we can increase their ability by supporting them.
Back to the detained bloggers, most of the Egyptian bloggers are publishing the attached banner on their sidebar, which lists the names of all the detainees, including bloggers (names followed with asterisk). The title of the banners reads:
الأسماء التالية معتقلون جوه الزنزانه، أما بقيه الشعب المصري، معتقلين برة الزنزانه
The following is the names of detainees inside the prisons, but the rest of Egyptians are detained outside the prisons.
One of the other remarkable notes is the published letters of the detainees. Following the first letter from inside the prison by Alaa, Manalaa blog has dedicated a page for these letter. So did Kefaya Heros blog in publishing letter from a lot other detainees beside many news and poems in support for all the detainees.
Keeping in mind that among Alaa group of detainees was, Asma'a, a young female blogger. wa7da_masrya published what seems to be a letter from Asma'a, Rasha and Nada. They describe the horror moments of there detention, interrogation and life inside a ‘criminal’ prison:
يعاني السجن من حالة أزدحام شديد لدرجة ان عدد كبير من السجينات ينام مفترشا الأرض حتى داخل الحمام و لولا ان بعض السجينات تنازلن لنا عن أسررتهن في أصرار و كرم شديدين لأاضطررنا لمشاركتهن نفس الحالة ولا يتوافر للسجينات أدنى درجة من الحياة الأدمية و الرعاية الصحية
The prison suffer from great congestion were a large number of prisoners sleep on floor or even inside the bathrooms, but some imprisoned females insisted to give us their beds, otherwise we would have no choice but to share the floor. The situation here is inhuman and no health care is available.
We hope to hear some (more) good news soon!
2 comments
Thank you for the translation!
Farid – unfortunately, Curt Hopkins has announced that he won’t be operating Committee to Protect Bloggers in the future. It became very difficult for him to run the organization without financial support. However, there’s a strong movement within Global Voices to pick up some of the work his group was doing and promote the plight of detained bloggers around the world through our site.