2023-07-19 23:19:27
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. Bandar Algaloud/Courtesy Saudi Royal Court/Handout via REUTERS
Egyptian President Abdefaltah al Sisi today pardoned Christian activist Patrick Zaki, who was sentenced yesterday to three years in prison, and human rights lawyer Mohamed el Baqer, the lawyer for Alaa Abdel Fattah, Egypt’s best-known political detainee. , in an unprecedented pardon to important figures of Egyptian civil society.
“Egyptian President Abdelfatah al-Sisi used his constitutional authority and issued a pardon decree to a group of people who were sentenced, including Patrick Zaki and Mohamed al-Baqer, in response to the call of the National Dialogue Council and the forces policies”, said the deputy and head of the human rights committee of the Egyptian Parliament, Mohamed Abdelaziz, on his official Facebook account.
So far there are no more details about the rest of those released in information that has also been confirmed by the presidential pardon committee and local NGOs.
Yesterday, the National Dialogue initiative issued a statement in which it called for the immediate release of Zaki, a rare movement of this committee formed between members of different political forces, including opponents, to seek a consensus on various issues in order to guide the Arab country on issues in which they were being criticized, such as economic management and human rights.
Yesterday, an Egyptian emergency court sentenced Patrick Zaki, an Egyptian student at the University of Bologna in northern Italy, to three years in prison, who was arrested in Egypt in February 2020 on charges of spreading false news and committing acts of “terrorism”
Activist Patrick Zaki. Capture
This ruling, which could not be appealed as it had been ruled by an emergency court, unleashed a wave of international reactions calling for his release, including from the US government and the UN.
Al Baqer was sentenced in 2021 by an emergency court to four years in prison, after having spent two years in preventive custody after he went to the Egyptian Attorney General’s Office to defend the prominent pro-democracy activist, Alaa Abdelfatah, and ended up himself arrested, accused of “terrorism-related activities”, according to various NGOs.
He was sentenced for disseminating information that undermines state security, charges that are routinely applied against journalists, activists and dissidents from the government of the Egyptian president.
This move by Al Sisi comes less than a year after the presidential elections, in which he has not yet announced his intention to run, and in the midst of a serious economic crisis and the intention of the country of the pharaohs to get away from criticism for his lousy management of human rights.
(With information from EFE)
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