Egypt’s president: Police state has ended
CAIRO, Egypt (AP) — Egypt’s military-backed interim president said yesterday that the country’s uprisings have put an end to the police state, even as the Government came under new criticism over abuses by security forces amid a heavy-handed crackdown on Islamists and other dissenters.
Adly Mansour’s comments were part of a campaign to rehabilitate the image of the security agencies, whose abuses and grip on political life were a major factor fuelling the 2011 uprising that ousted autocrat Hosni Mubarak, which marks its third anniversary Saturday. Though there has been little reform of the agencies since, the police have surged back into prominence, touted by authorities as heroes, after the military’s ouster of Mubarak’s elected successor, Islamist Mohammed Morsi.
Since Morsi’s ouster on July 3, security forces have jailed thousands of members of his Muslim Brotherhood, which has also been declared a terrorist organisation. Hundreds of Morsi supporters were killed in police crackdowns on their protests. Amid a wave of nationalist sentiment, the crackdown has extended to other critics: A number of journalists and many of the top secular activists who led the anti-Mubarak uprising and oppose the military’s dominance now have been detained.
In the latest sign of the air of intimidation against dissent, a court sentenced a blogger, Ahmed Anwar, to three months in prison yesterday for “insulting the police” and “misusing the Internet” over a video he posted on YouTube depicting policemen belly dancing — mocking police for recently giving an award to a well-known belly dancer
Anwar told The Associated Press he would appeal, saying the ruling contradicts the new constitution that includes guarantees of freedom of speech, passed earlier this month in a referendum. “Everyone and the media hailed (it) as the best constitution. I was sentenced for a video,” he said.
The deputy Mideast-North Africa director of Amnesty International on Thursday called on Egyptian authorities to “change course and take concrete steps to show they respect human rights and rule of law,” including release “prisoners of conscience”.
Otherwise, “Egypt is likely to find its jails packed with unlawfully detained prisoners and its morgues and hospitals with yet more victims of arbitrary and abusive force by its police,” said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui.
Egypt’s Foreign Ministry described the report as “tarnishing the facts” and said the government respects human rights while it is engaged in “combating terrorism”.
Millions protested against rule by Morsi and the Brotherhood over the summer, prompting the coup.
In 2011, activists launched their anti-Mubarak protests intentionally on Police Day , a holiday commemorating the security forces, which falls on Saturday, to denounce the widespread abuses by security agencies under his nearly 30-year rule — including torture, arbitrary arrests and corruption. The protests swelled into an all-out revolt against him, fuelled by hatred of police, as well as economic woes and frustration with years of autocracy. Police forces virtually collapsed after battles with protesters.