The family of Abdullah Al-Fakharany released a statement Friday calling on people to stand in solidarity with him to help in his release.
They added, in the statement, that “he was wronged greatly” by the life sentence handed to him earlier this year.
The statement was released on the second anniversary of the dispersal of the Rabaa Al-Adaweya and Al-Nahda Square sit-ins.
Al-Fakharany was arrested on 25 August 2013, 11 days following the dispersals, and has since then been placed in Istikbal Tora Prison.
He was sentenced to life imprisonment on 11 April 2014, when the Cairo Criminal Court, headed by Judge Nagy Shehata, issued a verdict on defendants of the “Rabaa Operations Room” case.
The case included 51 defendants, 37 of whom were handed life sentences, including 14 journalists and media workers. The remaining 14 were handed the death sentence, including Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Mohamed Badie.
The defendants stood charged with “forming an operations room to direct the terrorist Muslim Brotherhood to defy the government during the Rabaa Al-Adaweya sit-in dispersal, and to spread chaos in the country”, according to a February 2014 statement by the General Prosecution.
The first appeal on the court’s decision is scheduled to take place on the first of October.
Al-Fakaharany’s family launched a solidarity campaign through social media platforms, calling for his release and recounting the details of his arrest. According to the family’s statement, he was arrested along with renowned activist Mohamed Soltan, who later surrendered his Egyptian nationality to allow for his release.
Al-Fakaharany, now 23, was a board member of the Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated Rassd News Network. According to his family’s statement, he also joined the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, which has issued a number of statements calling for his release.
