1 - 7 November 2001
Issue No.558
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 1 - 7 November 2001 Issue No.558 |
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Hetata retires
PRESIDENT Hosni Mubarak on Tuesday received Lt Gen Magdi Hetata who retired as chief of staff of the armed forces.Mubarak awarded Hetata the medal of the republic, first class and issued a decree appointing him board chairman of the Arab Authority for Industrialisation.
Hetata's post was filled by Lt Gen Hamdi Wheiba, a former major general and commander of the Republican Guard.
Deviant sect
EIGHT Egyptians will soon stand trial in the State Security Misdemeanours Court on charges of defaming Islam and establishing a sect that propagates ideas contrary to the religion's principles. The accused are said to oppose the teachings of the Prophet Mohamed and call for a month of fasting other than Ramadan. They also argue that there is no specific ritual for prayers and that the pilgrimage to Mecca is akin to paganism.Prosecution authorities said the principal defendant, presumably the group's head, held meetings at his house and distributed research works and tapes of his teachings. Investigators confiscated a book, The Purification and Elevation of Religion and Values, said to have been authored by the defendant.
The defendants will be tried according to the Emergency Law in which the rulings handed down by the court cannot be appealed. They face up to five years in jail with hard labour.
El-Filali again
AT THE opening of the retrial of Sherif El-Filali, acquitted by a state security court in June on charges of allegedly spying for Israel, the State Security Prosecutor on Sunday again demanded the maximum 25-year prison sentence.In June, the presiding judge said he was certain the 35-year-old engineer, who spent the last 10 years in Europe, was involved in spying for Israel, but decided to acquit him because El-Filali voluntarily informed the Egyptian intelligence about his activities.
El-Filali was arrested in September last year and remained in prison until June. He spent only a few weeks with his family before being arrested again.
Because El-Filali was being tried according to the 1981 Emergency Law, his sentence had to be ratified by the office of the President of the Republic. The state security prosecution advised the president not to ratify the sentence and to order a retrial in another circuit. According to the Emergency Law, convicts cannot appeal sentences but can ask for clemency. Security sources denied El-Filali confessed to all his crimes during interrogation by prosecutors but said they suspected he wanted to work as a double agent.
A Russian national who was tried in absentia was charged with recruiting El-Filali to work for the Israeli intelligence service, the Mossad, and was given a life sentence.
The court scheduled the next hearing for 22 December.
Environment challenge
NADIA MAKRAM EBEID, minister of state for environmental affairs, said on Monday that ecological problems pose a real challenge to the world, particularly to developing nations, reports Mahmoud Bakr.Ebeid was addressing the opening of a three-day international conference and trade fair for environmental management and technologies, held under the auspices of Mrs Suzanne Mubarak. She said the government was doing its best to solve the many accumulated environmental problems and strike a balance between the solutions and ambitious development programmes.
The conference discussed 85 research papers submitted by more than 100 scientists and researchers covering environmental management systems, pollution reduction, hazardous wastes and water pollution.
Ebeid reaffirmed the importance of the role that could be played by the private sector in solving environmental problems.
Act of cruelty
A MOVIE actress is currently on the run after being accused of severely injuring her two teenaged maids. One maid, a15-year-old, was taken to hospital with third degree burns. Police investigations say Wafa'a Mekki, along with fellow actor and long-time friend Ahmed El-Borei, arranged to abandon the maids near their hometown of Qweissna after realising that the girls might succumb to their injuries. El-Borei, who denied involvement, was identified by the maids as having driven Mekki's car to Qweissna. Press reports said Mekki, who has played mainly supporting roles during her television and film career, had sought an out-of-court settlement and had offered the girls' father an unspecified but reportedly large amount of money which he turned down.
Book thief
AN ARAB university student who tried to sneak out of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina with a rare book on music hidden under his clothes has been arrested by security men. The huge library, situated on the Mediterranean coast, was opened for the public in June 2001, more than 20 years after the idea was conceived and seven years after construction began. The formal grand opening is scheduled for April 2002.
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