Caabu Letter to the Foreign Secretary about detention of Hossam Bahgat in Egypt

Caabu has written to the British Foreign Secretary regarding the detention of Hossam Bahgat. 

Caabu has written to the British Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond, to urge him to raise the issue of the detention of Hossam Bahgat with the Egyptian authorities. Hossam is an award winning human rights activist who addressed a Caabu event in 2011 in Parliament, was arrested on the grounds of spreading false news. 

9 November 2015

Dear Mr Hammond,

We are writing about the issue of arrests in Egypt of journalists and human rights defenders.  In particular we would like to raise with you the detention of Hossam Bahgat, an award winning human rights activist whom we were privileged to host in Parliament back in 2011.  He was founder of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) in 2002 and remained its executive director until 2013.  He has been charged with publishing ‘false information’ and referred to military prosecution.  The authorities promised to release him today Monday 9 November but this has been extended.

This comes against the broader backdrop of a severe crackdown on any freedom of expression in Egypt and any criticism of the President himself.

We hope that the British government will speak out clearly and forcefully against such actions.  Even the law whereby you can arrest someone for spreading false information is deeply problematic to put it mildly. It comes on the back of arrests of many journalists both Egyptian and international.

If Egypt is to progress as we all wish, then there needs to be a public debate about its future. Such a debate cannot happen in a climate where dissenters and human rights activists are imprisoned on such a dubious basis.

Yours Sincerely,

Chris Doyle

Director