By Sarah Carr
The policing policy of demonstrations remained unchanged in 2010, with frequent criticism of heavy-handed responses to protests.
On April 6, 2010 security officers cracked down on a peaceful demonstration against Egypt’s state of emergency, physically assaulting some and arresting more than 90.
A week later, during a demonstration organized to condemn the April 6 violence a group of police officers physically assaulted one protestor, Bahaa Saber, outside the police cordon imposed on the demonstration. Saber alleges that he was tortured while in police custody.
The death of Khaled Saeid sparked off a series of protests, all of which were put down violently by security bodies including a demonstration in central Cairo where protestors were physically assaulted, arrested and kettled for hours.
Workers ignored the police’s tight control on protests in the first half of this year when striking employees from various companies lined the street outside the People’s Assembly 24 hours a day, for almost six months.
The protests ended in May, when demonstrators were told to leave or else. A protest by striking Amonsito workers was violently broken up.
In May, the government renewed the state of emergency, in force since 1981, announcing that it would henceforth only apply to drugs and terrorism offences. Rights groups say that individuals detained for their religious or political beliefs remain in prison nonetheless.
In December of this year NGO the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) lodged a case with the African Commission concerning 60-year-old Mohamed El-Sharkawy, in administrative detention for 15 years without charge after his extradition from Pakistan in 1995.
Undercover Egyptian security forces detain an opposition supporter during a protest against the country’s emergency laws, in Cairo on April 6, 2010. (AFP Photo/ Amr Ahmad)
