FM demands UK authorities arrest Egyptian student attackers

CAIRO – 2 March 2018: Egypt’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs affirmed that it’s closely following the case of Mariam Moustafa Abdel Salam, an engineering student based in Nottingham, UK, after being brutally beaten by ten British women of African descent a few days ago.

In a statement issued Friday, Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesperson Ahmed Abu Zeid said they are following all of the case’s updates with her family and that they demanded the British authorities to take more serious steps in investigating the abusers, especially that they were captured by the CCTV cameras from the streets and bus where the incident took place.

The statement also accused the hospital were Moustafa was taken with “negligence”, as they gave her first aid treatment and checked her out while she needed more care; accordingly, she fell into coma shortly later. The ministry also hired Moustafa’s family a lawyer to follow the case’s legal updates, according to the statement.

Moustafa’s mother posted a video on social media saying that her daughter is in critical condition due to being brutally beaten by the ten women. She claimed that the assault was race-motivated, as her daughter doesn’t actually know those girls at all and never talked with them before.



“Four months ago, two of the same ten women abused my daughter in the street with no specific reason. We went to the police station and issued an official complaint; however, nothing happened,” the women said in her video.

She added that when the ten women saw her in the street walking alone, they attacked her once again and dragged her about twenty meters in the street. “She managed to get up and run towards one of the buses, but they went after her and started to beat her again. Just one man tried to defend her, but no one else tried to interfere,” the mother said.

Moustafa’s lawyer, Ahmed Hamza, said in statements to “al-Ashera Masa'an” television talk show on February 28 that Moustafa’s health condition is not stable.



According to him, the 18-year-old girl is in coma due to two brain strokes that forced the brain to stop functioning. “The British police officers are not taking the investigation seriously for a reason we don’t get. The cameras are suppose to be working and all of the ten women have been captured; however, none of them were arrested until now,” Hamza said.

According to the Mirror website, Mariam was just offered a place at university in London to study engineering, and the incident took place as she was shopping alone in the city. She agreed to meet with her sister and mother later that day, but due to the escalating situation, she didn’t. The family was informed later that their daughter had been hospitalized.

In statements to the British-owned newspaper, Moustafa’s 15-year-old sister Mallak said that they are all angry because of what happened. “She is such a kind, ambitious person and one who was running after her dreams of being an engineer. We don't understand who would do this to her; she is very quiet and never gets involved in any problems. She was originally released from hospital on the same day, and once we got her home, she started to deteriorate and so she was rushed back to hospital,” she stated.

"We were told that there was bleeding in her brain and she had suffered a stroke; one side of her body is now not responding. She is now in a coma and has been in that way for a week since the night of the attack. We never got to find out what happened from her, because she didn't get a chance to tell us before she fell unwell,” the sister added.

"We are hoping that her brain is recovering while she is in a coma, and until that happens we will continue to be by her side every day at the hospital. We are all very shocked and upset and don't know what to do. We just want those who did this to Mariam to be found, as what has happened is wrong," Mallak concluded.