Egypt State Information Service slams 'flawed' HRW report

CAIRO – 11 September 2017: The Chairman of the Egypt State Information Service (ESIS) Diaa Rashwan held a press conference on Monday to display its views on the report issued on September 5 by New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) alleging security forces in Egypt of committing widespread torture.

Below is the full text of the ESIS statement:

About the Report

The previous introduction is an integral and fundamental part of the general and detailed observations on the last report issued last week by Human Rights Watch on Egypt, which are divided into the following:

Title and Topic: A Biased Political Position, Not Human Rights

• The well-known traditions of respectable human rights organizations' reports have been established to cover either a period of time (annual, semi-annual, quarterly or monthly) or to specialize in a particular subject over a reasonable period of time.

Although the report has attempted to give the impression that it tackles the subject of alleged torture in Egypt, it chose a completely political, and unprofessional title, "under the rule of al-Sisi." This political title is meant to defame President Sisi's rule, when in fact no date mentioned in the report matches those of the president's administration.

The conclusion of his presidential term is still nine months away and the president has not started a new term yet to have the HRW assess his tenure as though it has ended.

• This deliberate distortion to the image of the rule in Egypt stems from being biased to the Brotherhood’s allegations that the Army had toppled the former President Mohamed Morsi. The report ignored the popular revolution of millions of Egyptians on June 30 and July 3, 2013 rejecting the authoritarian religious rule of the Muslim Brotherhood. Such biased political judgments and accusations neither came in the end or even in the middle of the report, but rather in the first two paragraphs of the first page.

• The first paragraph described the regime of President Sisi, which has been leading the country since July 2013, as being “authoritarian”. According to the second paragraph, and far from any professional standards in Human Rights reports, it mentioned that “al-Sisi tried to attain political stability no matter what it would cost.” The report was formulated in a rhetoric that could only be found in statements of political opposition.

Methodology: The Brotherhood is the only source for Breaking down Human Rights Traditions:

The report mentioned in its very first lines that it had been methodically prepared, however, there are several salient professional observations which are:

• The report mentioned that a single researcher from the organization had conducted all the meetings with the allegedly tortured victims; thus contradicting the methodological principles of preparing such critical reports which necessitates that such visits should be made by a working team and not a single person, to ensure the accuracy of the information on the one hand, and avoid any possible partiality from any single researcher on the other hand.

• Within the framework of preparing this report, the organization did not refer to any subsequent stages of verification to certify the data collected by the single researcher in his alleged meetings; thus contradicting the established rules of the professional methodology of such reports.

• The report did not indicate that the single researcher had recorded or documented his alleged meetings with the 19 persons by any means, or that such persons had signed on what they accounted or had presented any written approval for using their words in this report.

• The report did not identify the locations of the alleged meetings; whether such meetings had been held in private or public places, in open or closed areas, or whether they had been held in the form of collective or individual meetings.

It is systematically known in this respect that the place of the meeting and the number of attendees could have a strong influence on the mentioned information, i.e., if such a place is affiliated to the Muslim Brotherhood, then the meeting will be directed in a pro-Muslim Brotherhood political track and consequently will end up hostile towards the current Egyptian political regime.

• What is even more obscure in this report, is that its only researcher was able, on his own, and with seemingly miraculous abilities, to reach those 19 persons across sparsely populated areas of Egypt and within a limited period of time, without referring to the kind of assistance he received in order to reach them that easily in a country with a population of around 93 million citizens.

It is also clear from the data mentioned in the report that all the 19 persons are members of, or report to, the Muslim Brotherhood. Thereupon, the researcher would not have been able to reach them without the help of the Brotherhood themselves, thus explaining the blatant political partiality against the regime in Egypt.

• The sole researcher took the information he had garnered from the alleged victims as undeniable facts, neglecting to document the alleged injured cases, whether by photos, medical certificates or official minutes. Instead, the organization published a 1:46 minute video of cartoons on what they imagined to be torture in Egypt.

Contradicting the methodology of respectable organizations in cases of alleged injuries resulting from torture, especially the kind of torture that cannot be concealed such as the removal of nails, the report did not mention that a specialized doctor had accompanied the researcher to view such cases, or that they had visited a hospital or a specialized clinic in this respect.

• The report’s majority is based on the biased passive statements on human rights in Egypt from one source, The Egyptian Coordination for Rights and Freedom. It is a political organization affiliated to the Brotherhood that acts under a cover of human rights.

It was established in August 2014 and is considered the Egyptian branch of what is called The International Coordination to Support Rights and Freedoms, that was established in Doha on October 9, 2013 upon a decision taken by what is called the International Conference of the World amid a Coup against the Will and Free Choice of the People, held in Istanbul on September 25-26, 2013. The media-woman, Marwa Abu Zeid, was the spokesperson for the Brotherhood’s channel, Misr 25, and their Rasd network, when it was established.

• Conventional methodologies in writing human rights reports have established the use of impartial terms to scrutinize the accounts until proven true, such as using the terms “claimed” or “alleged”. This politicized report, however, did not employ any of these impartial terms, but rather, presented all accusations as confirmed and proven facts.

• The report’s methodology insisted on neglecting all valuable reports, released by major human rights organizations, which totally or partially contradict its allegations. The reports ignored include those released by the National Council for Human Rights, and the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights, concerning the allegations of torture or compulsory disappearance or killing without legal reasons or others.

• Finally, and amidst this biased report against the Egyptian authorities, those who prepared it in the duration of one year and seven months, during which they completed it since the beginning of the claimed meetings, have not sought to become acquainted with what the official Egyptian authorities had to say in regards to the reports of those who claimed torture.

Moreover, they failed to mention any attempts to interview any Egyptian officials that were turned down. However, to avoid being blamed, they sufficed by publishing two messages, sent to the Egyptian Prosecutor General and Interior Minister on May 23, 2017, and failed to state any details on the cases mentioned in the report for a reply, but rather sent a general summary of all alleged torture accounts.

Information: Fabrication and Concealment

• The report contained a large number of fallacies and misleading information, apparently intended to convey the political message which its title bore, namely, the accusation and condemnation of the Egyptian regime led by President Sisi against the systematic violation of human rights. In order to achieve that target, the report also deliberately ignored the reference to the type of static information whose publication will corrupt its political objective. Salient types of the aforementioned information are outlined below:

• The report deliberately ignores completely all acts of terrorism and killings in Egypt that have occurred in a systematic way since 2013 by the Brotherhood's terrorist groups and other violent organizations, so that alleged cases of torture appear isolated from the general context.

This does not mean that the existence of such a state of terrorism can justify, in our view, even one case of torture, but the reference to it and its victims who have lost their lives, which is the first human right, is the duty of any respectable report on these rights. The report, also, ignored the number of martyrs of Egyptian civilians caused by terrorist operations since January 2013 until present, which has exceeded 700 martyrs, while the number of wounded is three times higher.

In addition, several hundreds of martyrs and casualties of the army have died as a consequence of these terrorist acts, alongside the number of police martyrs that has reached approximately 1,000 and the wounded that has reached about 20,000, and six judges, of which the Prosecutor General Hisham Barakat was one of them.

• On page 12 of the Arabic version, the report mentioned the Itihadeya incident that took place on the December 5, 2012, when armed groups of the Muslim Brotherhood attacked, detained, and tortured a number of peaceful protesters around the Itihadeya palace, who opposed the former President Mohamed Morsi.

The report deliberately did not mention the term “torture” despite the availability of dozens of videos on this incident and the torture that was inflicted in it, and the issuance of judicial rulings condemning the perpetrators of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Moreover, the report of this organization, which claims its concern for the freedom of the press and the protection of journalists, has completely failed to mention the fall of the most prominent press martyr Husseini Abu Deif by the Muslim Brotherhood in these events, while he was on duty as a press photographer, when it did not fail to mention the 8 Morsi supporters killed on that day.

• On page 14 of the Arabic version as well as many other contexts, the report asserts in a completely false manner that among the hundreds of allegations raised against members and officers of the Ministry of Interior since July 2013, the Prosecutor General has investigated officially only 40 cases, of which only 7 were sentenced and of those, six cases involved 13 police officers who were found guilty by the criminal courts.

• However, the report did not point out that the Court of Appeal upheld these sentences until the preparation of this report. Until now, there is no court in Egypt’s modern history that has issued any judicial convictions on an element or officer belonging to the National Security.

The accurate information in this regard during such a period, is that the Court of Cassation which is the Egyptian judicial system, upheld completely the imprisonment of two police officers, and two non-commissioned police officers for 3 years in a torturing case and other two non-commissioned police officers for 10 years in another case as well as a police officer for 5 years in a third case.

• Moreover, the criminal courts issued various judgments of conviction and imprisonment for about 60 police officers, non-commissioned police officers and police conscripts. All these cases are still under the consideration of the Court of Appeal, Court of Cassation and retrial.

Some 45 of the police officers from different ranks stand before the courts and prosecution investigations until now. The numbers of condemned and accused police officers in torturing cases or violation of human rights cases are considered a minority compared to the huge number of police officers, which is estimated at 40,000 personnel in addition to about 300,000 non-commissioned police officers and police conscripts under the Interior Ministry.

• On page 22 of the Arabic version, the report mentioned the case of Omar Al-Shoykh who was arrested on March 24, 2014, when President Sisi had not assumed office yet. Again confirming the political target of the organization that aims to accuse and distort his regime.

• On page 31 of the Arabic version, the report mentioned Khaled’s case from Alexandria. Surprisingly, the military prosecution which is the organization that is affiliated to the Armed Forces, the President’s military and military rule, and the organization responsible for the said torture, released him. Nevertheless, the report supposed the organization to be crueler towards the accused person than is actually true.

• In all 19 cases mentioned in the report, its writers, purposely, did not completely point out the accusations directed to the allegedly tortured persons, in order for the reader to sympathize with them. Highlighting the seriousness of accusations and facts does not mean we accept the torture or abuse of any accused person, but is only meant to serve in presenting all facts to the reader. The accusations vary between killing, bombing, burning and assassinating.

Final General Remarks

In addition to what was mentioned before, there is a number of salient final and general remarks about the report which are:

- The first general remark about what was mentioned in the report and about the claimed torture in prisons for the Muslim Brotherhood prisoners and other terrorist groups, is related to what used to happen during the rule of the former President Hosni Mubarak.

The defendants and their lawyers would raise the issue of torture in nearly all terrorist cases in the trial sessions and would demand legal medical examinations to be carried out on prisoners. The courts took into consideration these claims several times and disregarded confessions before the trial just as in the Major Jihad Organization case in 1981, where 301 were accused.

Considering hundreds of cases where the Brotherhood were judged post-June 30 Revolution in 2013, security torture was not mentioned except for five Brotherhood leaders in two cases and the court responded and referred them to legal medical examination, where investigations were not finished.

This result assured the inaccuracy of the Brotherhood’s torture claims and this report. However, if this claimed report was accurate, it would give the chance for Brotherhood convicts to nullify their verdicts on the one hand, and political condemnation and international defamation for the ruling regime on the other hand, which did not happen.

- The report referred to two cases only from those who claimed torture in the trial and they were from the Islamic State in Iraq and Levant (ISIL). This is not out of the context of ISIL members cases, as they are the majority of those who claim torture, and in trials four times, which is similar to what peer violent groups carried out in Mubarak's era as mentioned before.

Here a contradiction in the report presents itself about the defendants accounts on the claimed torture that was made before the persecution which they claimed refused to approve it, and which was also not mentioned before the court that opened its doors for media and public opinion.

- Finally, if we suppose that all of the report’s contents are true about claimed torture cases, that means that a year and seven months of investigations and researches of the major international organization with its capabilities and experience, about torture in Sisi's era, which according to the report is 3 years and 3 months of his presidential term until now, produced only 19 cases. If any of them prove true, it shall be categorically rejected.

- If we take into consideration the number of prisoners claimed by the organization which it estimated to be tens of thousands, the weakness of the ratio of the claimed torture was highlighted. The numbers, ratios and periods assured that there is no systematic torture in Egypt except for rare individual cases, where the law must be enforced nevertheless.