London – November 19, 2016
Arab Media Freedom Monitor “Ikshef” is severely shocked by of today’s ruling by Egypt Qasr al-Nil court of sentencing head of Egyptian Journalists’ Syndicate Mr. Yehia Qalash, his debuty Khaled Al-Balshi and the syndicates general secretaty Gamal Abdel-Rahim for two years and fining each 1,0,000 Egyptian pounds (about $ 650) to stop the execution of the sentence.
Ikshef confirms that this ruling is a new message of intimidation against press and media, and is confirm that there is no one of the journalists and media workers immune from prosecution and discipline no matter who he is. Therefore, journalists’ community must understand the message and move to address it with all legitimate ways so that the authorities does not understand that silence journalists is a sign of acceptance and satisfaction with what happend to EJS head. Otherwise, this would give it extra boldness for further prosecution of journalists, newspapers and channels.
