The Misdemeanour Court of Marg adjourned Wednesday the trial of 6 April Movement coordinator Amr Ali to 1 February, the Arab Network for Human Rights and Information (ANHRI) reported.
After several months of having his detention renewed, Ali was referred to trial on Wednesday where the court announced that the case does not fall under its jurisdiction. Ali is facing charges of belonging to an outlawed organisation, his lawyer said.
“I personally think the charge directed to Ali is ambiguous. It does not state which organisation he is charged with belonging to or how they managed to prove this,” the lawyer, who works at ANHRI, told Daily News Egypt. “Such a broad accusation term makes more people prone to arrests.”
According to the lawyer, the defence team is currently seeking the legal evidence behind the charges and preparing the documents required for the upcoming trial session in early February.
Ali appeared in Tora Prison a few days after his arrest in late September and received 15 days of detention pending investigations. According to local rights campaign Freedom for the Brave, he was arrested from his home in Menufiya.
The 6 April Youth Movement was banned in April 2014 by the Cairo Court for Urgent Matters on the grounds of “espionage” and “destabilising Egypt’s image”. Key figures from the movement remain behind bars, notably Ahmed Maher and Ahmed Douma, who were sentenced on charges of violating the Protest Law.
Meanwhile an appeal on the arrest of four more members of the 6 April Movement was rejected. The defendants were charged with blocking roads, protesting without prior permission, and carrying “seditious banners” on the fourth anniversary of the Mohamed Mahmoud clashes last November, along with dozens of others who were released later.
On the anniversary, a group of young political activists marched on 6 October Bridge as they made their way to Tahrir Square to commemorate the victims of the first clashes between protestors and security forces in Mohamed Mahmoud Street in November 2011.
In mid-December, the defendants were sentenced to two years of imprisonment.
The Protest Law’s issuance by the interim government in November 2013 came at a time of frequent clashes between Muslim Brotherhood supporters and security forces. Since the law was enacted, it has been used to build several cases against students and activists on charges of “illegal assembly”.
