Egypt - One Court, One Month: 1212 Death Sentences

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May 15, 2014 Egypt
[Logo of the Alkarama Foundation. Image from alkarama.org] [Logo of the Alkarama Foundation. Image from alkarama.org]

Egypt - One Court, One Month: 1212 Death Sentences

By : Jadaliyya Reports

[The following briefing was published by the Alkarama Foundation on 29 April 2014]

Within a month, the Al Minya Criminal Court handed down in two separate verdicts 1212 death sentences following blatantly unfair and speedy trials in relation to the demonstrations that happened on 14 August 2013. In the first case, 37 Muslim Brotherhood supporters had their death sentence, issued on 24 March 2014, upheld, while the 491 remaining accused had their sentence commuted into life imprisonment. In the second case, 683 alleged supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi, including the Muslim Brotherhood`s leader Mohammed Badie, were also sentenced to death on 28 April 2014. Alleged charges include `murdering a policeman`, `damaging public and private property` and `harming public order`. These shocking sentences resulting from massive unfair trials provoked an outburst of the international civil society and community. Most recently, UN High Commissioner Navi Pillay said: "It is outrageous that for the second time (...) the Sixth Chamber of the Criminal Court of Al Minya has imposed the death sentence on huge groups of defendants after perfunctory trials".

After the destitution of President Mohamed Morsi by the military on 3 July 2013, protests spread out throughout Egypt and were violently repressed by the army and the police who used live ammunition, causing many victims. On 14 August 2013, the military authorities, after having imposed a state of emergency, invested public places where protesters used to gather, using military means, killing at least 985 people and injuring several thousand others. Hundreds of protestors were also arrested and prosecuted on various charges such as "belonging to a terrorist organisation" or "committing terrorist acts".

The Al Minya Governorate witnessed, as an Islamist stronghold, large movements of popular protests against the military takeover. Hundreds of people known for their actual or alleged support to the Muslim Brotherhood, to its political arm - the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) - or for their participation in the protests were arrested and detained, whether on the streets, at their home or workplace and severely tortured at the security services` premises. They were then charged with "harming public order", "damaging private and public property", "obstructing the intervention of law enforcement forces", "attacking a police station" and "causing the death of a police officer".

The loopholes of the investigation proceedings
In both cases, the investigation proceedings, clearly violating the right of defence, presaged the outcome of the trials. They were carried out against the accused in a particularly speedy manner in spite of the seriousness of the accusations, punishable by the death penalty according to the new so-called "anti-terrorist" legislation.

In the first case, the order of referral to the Criminal Court, No. 1852/2013, issued by the Al Minya General Prosecutor`s counsel, Mr Abderrahim Abdelmalek, clearly shows that no real preliminary investigation was conducted. The order confines itself to listing all the accused and charging them collectively with a few crimes.

The defendants` lawyers, who were appointed during the preliminary investigation stage, identified serious violations of their clients` rights and protested against what was a parody of justice. In retaliation, they were themselves subjected to threats and arbitrary arrests for their alleged "support to a terrorist organisation".

37 deaths sentences upheld despite grossly unfair trial

In the case of the 529 Egyptians sentenced to death, the trial proceedings were distinctively speedy. There were only two hearings, including one which lasted only 20 minutes. Most of the international standards for a fair trial enshrined in the International Convention for Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) were blatantly violated.

The defence lawyers originally appointed by the victims were replaced by lawyers chosen by the Al Minya Court. In fact, the defendants were not able to communicate freely with their legal counsel before the trial, some lawyers were even banned from accessing the courtroom and thus unable to assist their clients. When the lawyers started to protest, the judge uttered insults against them before asking the security forces to intervene and get them out the courtroom.

The defendants have had no opportunity to defend themselves during the hearings, nor did they have had time or the facilities required to do so. They could not call any defence witness to testify, as they were blocked from entering the courtroom. Only one witness from the prosecution was called to testify: a police officer of Matay station who was not present during the events. The judge himself showed a clear bias all along the court hearings against the accused, calling them `terrorists`, in clear violation of the presumption of innocence guaranteed by international norms related to a fair trial.

Despite the fact that 118 out of the 529 defendants were detained at the time of the trial, only 64 were able to stand in trial and appeared physically, the remaining 54 others accused, although detained, were not even presented to the court in flagrant violation of the principles established by the ICCPR. As for the 410 other defendants considered as `fugitives`, none of them was legally summoned to appear before the court. In addition, the public, including lawyers, journalists and the defendants` relatives, were not allowed access to the trial and security services blocked the entry of the courthouse. Last but not least, some defense counsels received death threats from the security services. Some of them were subjected to an arrest warrant issued by the General Prosecutor and had to flee the country, fearing for their lives.

On 24 March 2014, the 529 defendants were collectively sentenced to death for having "harmed public order", "damaged public and private property", "stormed a police station" and "murdered or incited to murder a police officer". Their case was then referred to the grand Mufti, Egypt`s top religion official appointed by the military authorities, for a non-binding procedural review. On 28 April 2014, after the grand Mufti`s review was given, the final verdict was handed down by Judge Said Youssef Saad Sabraa, who upheld the death sentence for 37 individuals and commuted most of the 492 remaining death sentences to life imprisonment – for most of them in absentia. In fact, seven of these individuals are currently detained in Al Wadi Al Jadid Prison, located hundreds of kilometers away from Al Minya. On this specific case, Pillay stated: "In defiance of worldwide pleas for Egypt to respect its human rights obligations after 529 people were sentenced to death in March by the same court, hundreds now face a similar fate at the hands of a judicial system where international fair trial guarantees appear to be increasingly trampled upon."

683 alleged Morsi`s supporters sentenced to death

Yesterday, on Monday 28 April 2014, in a separate but similar case, the Al Minya Court condemned Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Mohammed Badie and 682 Muslim Brotherhood alleged supporters, to death sentence on charges of "murdering a policeman in Adwa" on 14 August 2013 during the attack of Adwa`s police station. According to several testimonies, some of the individuals sentenced were not present at that time and place, including Dr Badie, or even dead.

This verdict is actually the first to be handed down against Mohammed Badie, who is facing several trials on various charges along with Mohamed Morsi. He was not present during the hearing, as he was appearing before another court in Cairo, where he faces charges of murder and incitement to murder in a case connected to deadly protests in June.

While Monday`s hearing only lasted about 10 minutes, the evidence presented by the General Prosecutor consisted mostly of footages showing the defendants allegedly attacking a police station. Like in the other trial, the defense counsels were not allowed to present their case nor have witnesses testify and most of the defendants were not even able to attend the hearings.

The Al Minya Court is set to issue its final verdict against the 683 defendants – for most of them in absentia – on 21 June 2014 after the case is referred to Egypt`s grand Mufti for review, which is however generally considered a formality as his decision is not binding.

Mockery of justice in intensifying crackdown on dissent

In a statement jointly issued on 31 March 2014, the eight Special Rapporteurs said that these trials were clearly a "mockery of justice". These rulings are clearly part of an orchestrated campaign to stifle any dissent and are just extreme examples in a pattern of politicized implausible verdicts handed down to support the military rule.

These sentences were handed down in an escalation of the crackdown on all anti-military protestors, whether from the Muslim Brotherhood or liberal and secular movements. In this regard, the very same day, the two cases` verdicts were issued by Al Minya Court: the Cairo Court of urgent matters banned the April 6 Youth Movement which played a key role in the 2011 uprising against Mubarak for "conspiring with foreign powers" and "committing acts that distort the image of Egypt".

Today, Alkarama solicited the urgent intervention of UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Executions with the Egyptian authorities to demand that they abide by their international obligations resulting from the ratification of international human rights conventions, and therefore to cancel the 720 death sentences handed down after a grossly unfair trial, along with the 492 sentences to life imprisonment. Any implementation of the death sentenced would clearly be extrajudicial executions. These requests echo Pillay`s statement. "A mass trial of hundreds of people, rife with procedural irregularities is simply not good enough for imposition of the death penalty. It is also a totally inadequate basis for sentencing 492 individuals to life in prison."

Since the military takeover, at least 16`000 people have been arrested and around 1`500 have been summarily executed by security forces, while thousands have been injured.
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Jadaliyya Reports By :
Jadaliyya Reports

Past is Present: Settler Colonialism Matters!

On 5-6 March 2011, the Palestine Society at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London will hold its seventh annual conference, "Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine." This year`s conference aims to understand Zionism as a settler colonial project which has, for more than a century, subjected Palestine and Palestinians to a structural and violent form of destruction, dispossession, land appropriation and erasure in the pursuit of a new Jewish Israeli society. By organizing this conference, we hope to reclaim and revive the settler colonial paradigm and to outline its potential to inform and guide political strategy and mobilization.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is often described as unique and exceptional with little resemblance to other historical or ongoing colonial conflicts. Yet, for Zionism, like other settler colonial projects such as the British colonization of Ireland or European settlement of North America, South Africa or Australia, the imperative is to control the land and its resources -- and to displace the original inhabitants. Indeed, as conference keynote speaker Patrick Wolfe, one of the foremost scholars on settler colonialism and professor at La Trobe University in Victoria, Australia, argues, "the logic of this project, a sustained institutional tendency to eliminate the Indigenous population, informs a range of historical practices that might otherwise appear distinct--invasion is a structure not an event."[i]

Therefore, the classification of the Zionist movement as a settler colonial project, and the Israeli state as its manifestation, is not merely intended as a statement on the historical origins of Israel, nor as a rhetorical or polemical device. Rather, the aim is to highlight Zionism`s structural continuities and the ideology which informs Israeli policies and practices in Palestine and toward Palestinians everywhere. Thus, the Nakba -- whether viewed as a spontaneous, violent episode in war, or the implementation of a preconceived master plan -- should be understood as both the precondition for the creation of Israel and the logical outcome of Zionist settlement in Palestine.

Moreover, it is this same logic that sustains the continuation of the Nakba today. As remarked by Benny Morris, “had he [David Ben Gurion] carried out full expulsion--rather than partial--he would have stabilised the State of Israel for generations.”[ii] Yet, plagued by an “instability”--defined by the very existence of the Palestinian nation--Israel continues its daily state practices in its quest to fulfill Zionism’s logic to maximize the amount of land under its control with the minimum number of Palestinians on it. These practices take a painful array of manifestations: aerial and maritime bombardment, massacre and invasion, house demolitions, land theft, identity card confiscation, racist laws and loyalty tests, the wall, the siege on Gaza, cultural appropriation, and the dependence on willing (or unwilling) native collaboration and security arrangements, all with the continued support and backing of imperial power. 

Despite these enduring practices however, the settler colonial paradigm has largely fallen into disuse. As a paradigm, it once served as a primary ideological and political framework for all Palestinian political factions and trends, and informed the intellectual work of committed academics and revolutionary scholars, both Palestinians and Jews.

The conference thus asks where and why the settler colonial paradigm was lost, both in scholarship on Palestine and in politics; how do current analyses and theoretical trends that have arisen in its place address present and historical realities? While acknowledging the creativity of these new interpretations, we must nonetheless ask: when exactly did Palestinian natives find themselves in a "post-colonial" condition? When did the ongoing struggle over land become a "post-conflict" situation? When did Israel become a "post-Zionist" society? And when did the fortification of Palestinian ghettos and reservations become "state-building"?

In outlining settler colonialism as a central paradigm from which to understand Palestine, this conference re-invigorates it as a tool by which to analyze the present situation. In doing so, it contests solutions which accommodate Zionism, and more significantly, builds settler colonialism as a political analysis that can embolden and inform a strategy of active, mutual, and principled Palestinian alignment with the Arab struggle for self-determination, and indigenous struggles in the US, Latin America, Oceania, and elsewhere.

Such an alignment would expand the tools available to Palestinians and their solidarity movement, and reconnect the struggle to its own history of anti-colonial internationalism. At its core, this internationalism asserts that the Palestinian struggle against Zionist settler colonialism can only be won when it is embedded within, and empowered by, the broader Arab movement for emancipation and the indigenous, anti-racist and anti-colonial movement--from Arizona to Auckland.

SOAS Palestine Society invites everyone to join us at what promises to be a significant intervention in Palestine activism and scholarship.

For over 30 years, SOAS Palestine Society has heightened awareness and understanding of the Palestinian people, their rights, culture, and struggle for self-determination, amongst students, faculty, staff, and the broader public. SOAS Palestine society aims to continuously push the frontiers of discourse in an effort to make provocative arguments and to stimulate debate and organizing for justice in Palestine through relevant conferences, and events ranging from the intellectual and political impact of Edward Said`s life and work (2004), international law and the Palestine question (2005), the economy of Palestine and its occupation (2006), the one state (2007), 60 Years of Nakba, 60 Years of Resistance (2009), and most recently, the Left in Palestine (2010).

For more information on the SOAS Palestine Society 7th annual conference, Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine: www.soaspalsoc.org

SOAS Palestine Society Organizing Collective is a group of committed students that has undertaken to organize annual academic conferences on Palestine since 2003.

 

[i] Patrick Wolfe, Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology: The Politics and Poetics of an Ethnographic Event, Cassell, London, p. 163

[ii] Interview with Benny Morris, Survival of the Fittest, Haaretz, 9. January 2004, http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/art.php?aid=5412