H.E. Mohammed Hosni Mubarak
President
Oruba Palaca, Sharia Oruba
Heliopolis, Cairo
Arab Republic of Egypt
Fax: (011.20.2) 795.3192
Your Excellency:
The Overseas Press Club of America, which has been defending the rights of journalists around the world for nearly seven decades, joins with other human-rights and jounalists’ associations to condemn the continuing — indeed the increasing — repression of the media in Egypt.
In the most recent case, Ibrahim Eissa was prosecuted for publishing “false information and rumors” about the state of Your Excellency’s health. Certainly, we were relieved this week to learn about his pardon. But “pardon” suggests some legitimacy to charges that Al-Dustour published reports “liable to disturb public security and damage public interest.” That such a charge can be made in a democratic society is hard for us to conceive.
We view this episode against the escalating abuse of our Egyptian colleagues. Eissa, for example, was one of four editors-in-chief sentenced in 2007 to a year’s hard labor on various politically motivated charges. (Eissa has appealed his conviction.) That same year, a dozen journalists were prosecuted on various charges of damaging either the national security or Egypt’s reputation. We note in particular the case of the editor-in-chief of the independent, Al-Dustour, who has been faced with criminal prosecutions for several years. At the beginning of 2008, an appeals court upheld the conviction of an Al-Jazeera journalist for showing pictures re-enacting police torture in Egypt (although her jail sentence was lifted). This week, two journalists will be brought up on criminal defamation cases for making fun of the rector of the Al-Azhar mosque.
We see several other signs that your government is equipping itself with more tools to restrict freedom of the press and expression. To control bloggers, for instance, the government requires Internet cafes to collect personal information about their customers. We also understand parliament will be examining a new broadcasting bill that would ban TV from causing various vaguely-defined offenses. Perhaps in anticipation of passage earlier this year, Nilesat, the government-owned satellite transmission company, abruptly stopped carrying the signal of Al-Hewar Television, a London-based station that perhaps paid too much attention to human rights.
Returning to the case of Mr. Eissa, the whole idea of a criminal prosecution for publishing reports of Your Excellency’s health, whether true or false, strikes at the heart of the rights to free expression contained in Egypt’s constitution. This prosecution does more damage to Egypt’s reputation than Mr. Eissa’s report, which probably would have been long forgotten if it had been simply ignored or countered with evidence of the state of Your Excellency’s health.
In many ways, Egypt’s media are diverse and vibrant. They can criticize government policy, but evidently not public figures or institutions. In a truly free country, these two must not be above criticism. If a public figure really feels slandered, the appropriate response should be in civil, not criminal, courts.
Respectfully yours,
Jeremy Main
Kevin McDermott
Freedom of the Press Committee
cc:
H.E. Atef Mohamed Ebeid
Prime Minister
Office of the Prime Minister
Sharia Maglis esh-Sha’ab
Cairo
Arab Republic of Egypt
Fax: (011.20.2) 355.8048
H.E. Nabil Fahmy
Ambassador of Egypt to the U.S.A.
Embassy of the Arab Republic of Egypt
3521 International Court, NW
Washington, DC 20008
Fax: (202) 244.5131
Ambassador Maged Abdelaziz
Permanent Representative
Permanent Mission of the Arab Republic of Egypt
to the United Nations
304 East 44th Street
New York, NY 10017
Fax: (212) 949.5999
The Editor
Egyptian Gazette
editor@egy.com
The Editor
Weekly Ahram
editor@weekly.ahram.org.eg
H.E. Margaret Scobey
U.S. Ambassador to Egypt Embassy of the United States of America
8 Kamal el Din Salah Street
Garden City, Cairo
Egypt
Fax: (011.20.2) 797.3200
Claude Salhani
Editor
The Middle East Times
editor@metimes.com