Ahdaf Soueif
by Ahdaf Soueif
The report leaked to the Guardian on the Egyptian military’s dealings with protesters during and after the revolution has been sitting on the Egyptian president’s desk since January.
Last May, when President Mohammed Mursi was making his case to be elected president for “all Egyptians”, he promised to deal with the issue of what had happened to thousands of our young people during the previous year. The year when the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) was “protecting the revolution and overseeing the transition to democracy” —as they described it — had been a year of escalating massacres, trials, torture and disappearance.
An elected government would deal with it as a priority, and Mursi had to form a fact-finding committee. The people who agreed to serve were determined not to be used as whitewash for anyone. The investigation was difficult; technically, physically, emotionally. The country wanted to know who had ordered the killings throughout the year? How come not one security camera carried usable footage? And how come not a single officer had been seriously tried or sentenced for any part of the suffering of the country?
An elected government, after a revolution, should be keen to put in place some form of transitional justice; to be seen caring for those who’d made sacrifices for the revolution. Instead, this government has gifted the army with a constitution that indemnifies it. And on the watch of this elected president the killings, maimings, disappearances and unfair trials have continued.
The events of Abbaseyya 2, recounted in the report, were replicated last Sunday at the cathedral – also in Abbaseyya. A new massacre was averted because activists recognised the tactics and would not be drawn.
On 26 February 2011 activists set up the ‘No to Military Trials for Civilians’ campaign to defend those court-martialled. Later, others set up They Lie, which opened the eyes of the country to the military’s murderous activities. They used footage from Mosireen, a revolutionary young film-makers’ collective. Another campaign, We’ll Find Them, traces the missing. Under Mursi, just as under the military, all efforts to defend, treat or trace people, to identify bodies in the morgue, to empower searching parents have been undertaken by young people. They have kept alive the vision of the revolution and the ideal of human rights for all. For this they are endangered and persecuted.
Like Hassan Mostafa, for example, the brave and popular young leader — falsely accused of hitting a prosecutor and sentenced to two years’ jail — whose appeal is being heard in an Alexandria court.
The Guardian
by Ahdaf Soueif
The report leaked to the Guardian on the Egyptian military’s dealings with protesters during and after the revolution has been sitting on the Egyptian president’s desk since January.
Last May, when President Mohammed Mursi was making his case to be elected president for “all Egyptians”, he promised to deal with the issue of what had happened to thousands of our young people during the previous year. The year when the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) was “protecting the revolution and overseeing the transition to democracy” —as they described it — had been a year of escalating massacres, trials, torture and disappearance.
An elected government would deal with it as a priority, and Mursi had to form a fact-finding committee. The people who agreed to serve were determined not to be used as whitewash for anyone. The investigation was difficult; technically, physically, emotionally. The country wanted to know who had ordered the killings throughout the year? How come not one security camera carried usable footage? And how come not a single officer had been seriously tried or sentenced for any part of the suffering of the country?
An elected government, after a revolution, should be keen to put in place some form of transitional justice; to be seen caring for those who’d made sacrifices for the revolution. Instead, this government has gifted the army with a constitution that indemnifies it. And on the watch of this elected president the killings, maimings, disappearances and unfair trials have continued.
The events of Abbaseyya 2, recounted in the report, were replicated last Sunday at the cathedral – also in Abbaseyya. A new massacre was averted because activists recognised the tactics and would not be drawn.
On 26 February 2011 activists set up the ‘No to Military Trials for Civilians’ campaign to defend those court-martialled. Later, others set up They Lie, which opened the eyes of the country to the military’s murderous activities. They used footage from Mosireen, a revolutionary young film-makers’ collective. Another campaign, We’ll Find Them, traces the missing. Under Mursi, just as under the military, all efforts to defend, treat or trace people, to identify bodies in the morgue, to empower searching parents have been undertaken by young people. They have kept alive the vision of the revolution and the ideal of human rights for all. For this they are endangered and persecuted.
Like Hassan Mostafa, for example, the brave and popular young leader — falsely accused of hitting a prosecutor and sentenced to two years’ jail — whose appeal is being heard in an Alexandria court.
The Guardian
