CAIRO: The State Council on Tuesday adjourned to May 10 a case filed by journalist Rasha Azab against the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) for authorizing trials of civilians in military courts.
"Egypt suffered a lot from exceptional and military trials of civilians during Mubarak’s dictatorship," said Azab’s lawyer Khaled Ali.
"Mubarak’s dictatorship is now being replaced by the endless powers given to the army council which now has the right to refer whoever it wants to military courts."
Rights groups allege that thousands of civilians were tried before military courts since the army took control following the bloody events of Jan.28.
"Only the youth of the revolution are being tried in front of military courts, while Mubarak and his sons are tried in front of civilian courts," Ali said. "We preserve Mubarak’s right to be tried in front of a civilian court, and we also want the same right to the civilians who fought a lot to turn this revolution into a success."
Azab told Daily News Egypt that this case is only the legal facet of a bigger campaign aiming to end military trials for civilians.
"Events have proven that the SCAF needs pressure to execute the revolution’s demands, and Mubarak’s trial is an example," Azab said.
"We are trying to pressure the SCAF into releasing all civilian prisoners and to have them tried before civilian courts so they can have the right to defend themselves," she added.
Azab hinted that the State Council and the Prosecutor General do not want to confront the SCAF, “but we need to keep the pressure so that the SCAF would listen to our demands,” she said.
The military council’s defense team, however, described Azab’s case as "an attempt by inciters to ruin the relationship between the people and the army,” denying any torture allegations or arrests by the military police.
"No decisions were taken by the SCAF to try civilians in front of military courts," said the head of the defense team. "According to Article 5 of the Military Law, armed forces have the right to detain and put on trial whoever commits any crimes in areas under its authority."
The defense team confirmed that the military police arrests people and tries them before the military prosecution according to the law.
Responding to the defense team’s remarks, Ali commented that the word "inciters” was used before during Muabark’s reign.
"Yes we incite people, and this should not be an accusation," said Ali. "We are revolutionaries who are trying to voice their concerns, and we should not forget that those inciters are the ones who toppled Mubarak’s dictatorship."
Meanwhile, SCAF promised in its 35th and 36th communiqués to reinvestigate the cases of a number of detainees, adding that all detention cases of Tahrir protesters will be reconsidered.
But some families of those detainees confirmed that no real action was taken. The SCAF had specifically mentioned the cases of detainees Amr Eissa and Mohamed Adel, but Adel’s mother, speaking to DNE in a previous interview, said that "Nothing new since then.”
"I went to the Ministry of Defense and showed them the SCAF’s statement. They said they will look into it, but no legal steps were taken," she said.
She questioned why her son was tried in three days while his release process was taking such a long time.
Azab, however, confirmed that the SCAF’s response to those cases is slow, but better late than never.
"When we started our campaign, the military completely denied our allegations, now due to pressure, they are moving, but slowly because our campaign isn’t very big," added Azab.
