The Emergency law No 162 of 1958, which has been in force in Egypt since the assassination of President Anwar El Sadat in October 1981, was due to expire in May 2003. However, the bill to extend state of emergency until 2006 was introduced on 23 February and voted on the same day by a wide majority in the People’s Assembly.
Numerous Egyptian non-governmental organisations, which have denounced the negative impacts of the Emergency law on human rights for years, had started a campaign for the non-renewal of this law.
Indeed the Emergency law grants broad power to impose restrictions on the freedoms of assembly, move or residence; the power to arrest and detain suspects or those deemed dangerous, and the power to search individuals and places without the need to follow the provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code (by virtue of article 3 of the emergency law). Freedom of expression is also restricted under the state of emergency as article 3 of the emergency law gives the military ruler or his deputy the power to monitor the newspapers, booklets and other publications.
Under the Emergency law, Egypt has made an extensive use of exceptional jurisdictions, such as the State Security Court and Supreme State Security Court to try civilians, in violation of the right to a fair trial, guaranteed by article 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Moreover, over the last weeks, the Emergency law has been extensively used to administratively detain people who participated in demonstration against a war in Iraq. It seems that several people have been detained "preventively" to stop them from participating in the February 15 demonstration. During the demonstration on Sunday 16, at least 5 more people were arrested and several more were injured. Already, on January 18th, the State Security Police arrested 11 alleged members of the Egyptian People’s Committee for Solidarity with the Palestinian Uprising who had demonstrated against a war against Iraq, under the charges of disrupting public order. Most of these demonstrators are still in detention awaiting trial at the prison of Tora. These arrests were followed by other detentions of antiwar activists including that of Kamal Khalil, director of the Socialist Research Center. Kamal Khalil was kidnapped on 19 February and held in solitary confinement for 5 days. The FIDH is particularly preoccupied with his health conditions as he recently had a surgery and is in need of medication.
The FIDH urges the Egyptian authorities to immediately release antiwar activists recently detained.
The FIDH considers that the continuous enforcement of the Emergency Law is no longer justifiable in Egypt, as no terrorist activities have been witnessed since 1997. The FIDH fears that the international situation and terrorism are used as pretexts to infringe upon basic freedoms in Egypt. As a consequence, the FIDH urges Egyptian authorities to withdraw this Emergency law.
Yours respectfully,
Sidiki Kaba
President