LONDON, May 30, 2016
(Ikshef) – Arab Media Freedom Monitor “Ikshef” denounces the decision of Egyptian prosecutors to release the Egyptian Journalists’ Syndicate “EJS”‘s head, his deputy and general secretary on huge bail pending further investigations accusing them of hiding wanted persons and publishing false news. This is an unprecedented procedure that is happening for the first time in the history of EJS; in the mean while the prosecution did not interrogate the officers who had stormed the EJS headquarters on May 1st in violation of law for the first time in its history.
Ikshef confirms that forcing EJS’s Head Yahya Qalash, his deputy Khalid Al-Balshy and EJS general secretary Gamal Abdel-Rahim to pay bail of 30 thousand pounds ($ 3000) each to be released pending investigations is a penalty violating law that prevents holding journalists on remand in publication cases; Therefore, the bail paid as an alternative to pre-trial detention is illegal and represent a punishment in itself, prompting EJS head and his two fellow journalists to refuse paying it, sticking to law, and rejecting legalizing it against other journalists.
Ikshef also confirms that the detention of three for over 14 hours under the pretext of interrogation, and holding them in a police station later, is a kind of harassment and reprisal against them as a punishment for their role in calling upon journalists to attend an emergency general meeting to protest the police storming of the headquarters in early May and arresting two journalists were taking refuge in EJS until they are provided guarantees for integrity of an investigation with them on charges of demonstrating without a license and spreading false news about a demarcation of the Egyptian-Saudi border agreement.
Ikshef believes that the ruling authority wanted to send a strong message to Egyptian journalists through this move, which is that there is no honoring for journalists nor any immunity for EJS; no retreat from the prosecution, imprisonment and chasing of journalists; journalists community has to accept what the of authority orders and dictates, follow it, and abandon journalists’ decisions and recommendations that were issued in the emergency general meeting in May, on top of which were a presidential apology, firing the interior minister and releasing imprisoned journalists.
Ikshef believes also that what happened came in the context of a systematic campaign against the freedom of the press in Egypt that escalated recently by raiding EJS headquarters and imprisoning a number of journalists to join a long list for more than 90 journalists, preventing the publication of articles by some of writers and intellectuals, stopping programs, pushing owners of TV channels to get rid of them, preparing for the issuance of a new media law enshrines state control over media in a clear breach of the constitution, an and finally escorting EJS head and two other board members to the prosecution.
Ikshef demands all bodies and organizations concerned with freedom of the press locally and internationally to move quickly to save the Egyptian press of this vicious attack it faces, which aims at removing all the democratic gains it achieved throughout its long struggle, and turn it into mere mouthpiece for the authority. Also, Ikshef demands urgent intervention by international Human Rights Council and the UN Special Rapporteur of freedom of expression to save Egyptian press.
