Issue No. 601
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29 August - 4 Sept. 2002 Issue No. 601 Home news |
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Recommend this page | ||
Another appeal
The lawyers of human rights activist Saadeddin Ibrahim began preparing for an appeal against the latest ruling in his case after the full details of the seven-year sentence were released on Sunday. Jailan Halawi reports
A Cairo State Security Court on Sunday released the full details of the seven-year sentence convicting prominent NGO figure Saadeddin Ibrahim on charges that include tarnishing Egypt's image abroad, embezzlement and receiving foreign funds without permission from the state.
Ibrahim, who is a dual national of Egypt and the United States, is the owner and director of the Ibn Khaldun Centre for Development Studies (ICDS) and a sociology professor at the American University in Cairo (AUC).
In its explanation of the 29 July ruling, the court said it was convinced that Ibrahim deliberately issued false reports about Egypt's internal situation with the intention of undermining the country's image. The reports, the court said, were sent abroad by fax and e-mail and claimed that Egypt's Copts were persecuted, a finding that the court described as false.
Further, the court found evidence of several deposits in the defendant's bank account and in those of his wife and daughter from the University of Haifa in Israel, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), a Swiss human rights organisation and the European Union (EU). The deposits, the court said, were in payment for the reports that Ibrahim prepared and issued abroad through the ICDS, which the court said he used as a "cover" for his "illegal" activities.
Speaking to Al-Ahram Weekly, Abdel-Qader Hashim, one of Ibrahim's lawyers, said that the defence team will contest the ruling with the Court of Cassation, the country's highest court, within the coming week. An appeal may only be submitted after the full details of a ruling are issued. In Ibrahim's case, if the appeal is accepted, he will have to be retried for a third and final time by the Court of Cassation.
"The state security court did not consider many documents and testimonies presented by Ibrahim's lawyers that could have altered its ruling," Hashim said.
He said that similar to the first trial, the court "completely adopted the prosecutor's point of view and ignored the defence's argument. The court dismissed the constitutional challenge to the military decree presented in detail by former Chief Justice of the Supreme Constitutional Court Dr Awad El-Morr, describing it as being not a serious constitutional challenge, but an attempt to delay the court proceedings."
Ibrahim was convicted of violating military decree No. 4 of 1992, which bans individuals from receiving funds from abroad without prior permission from the state. Conviction for this crime carries a sentence of up to 15 years in prison. Ibrahim was also convicted of embezzling the funds after his centre received them.
The ICDS received approximately $270,000 from the EU to fund a project aimed at encouraging Egyptians to vote in the parliamentary elections that took place on the year 2000. The prosecution described the project as hostile to Egypt.
Ibrahim was also found guilty of issuing statements on the treatment of Copts and human rights, that the court said "harmed Egypt's reputation abroad".
So far the details of the ruling are not much different from those of the first trial, the exception being mention of connections with the University of Haifa and NATO.
Although stunned by the details of the ruling, Barbara, Ibrahim's wife, expressed her optimism "we can mount a successful appeal. The court's findings are disappointing and we assume that the Court of Cassation will want to review them carefully."
With respect to the banking transactions, Barbara said, "They were not part of the prosecutors' reports, nor of the evidence, or of any court session that we attended; these are issues that have been raised for the first time in the judicial ruling as far as we know."
As a sociologist with an international reputation, Ibrahim has been involved in developmental work for decades. In recent years, however, he has been the subject of a heated controversy triggered by his sponsorship of a series of annual conferences on ethnic and religious minorities in the Arab world. Ibrahim's critics contended that the conferences classified Egyptian Copts as an ethnic minority, alongside the Kurds and southern Sudanese, provoking the wrath of the state and many Egyptian intellectuals, both Muslim and Christian. The state and these intellectuals say that Copts and Muslims are integral components of the same national and ethnic fabric, and accuse Ibrahim of pandering to extremist expatriate Coptic organisations in the US, which, they claim, are being supported by American Zionist groups to foment religious strife in Egypt.
Throughout his trial, Ibrahim insisted that the money he received from the EU was used in a manner similar to that of previous grants from the organisation in projects aimed at promoting issues like democracy and human rights.
In response to these charges, the EU has issued several statements confirming that it was satisfied with the way Ibrahim made use of its money and repeatedly praised his activities in the field of human rights.
Ibrahim attributes his arrest and trial to his declared intention to set up a committee to monitor parliamentary elections.
Ibrahim was first arrested along with 27 people working for the ICDS in June 2000. In May 2001, a state security court sentenced him and his aides to prison terms ranging between one and seven years. In February 2002, the Court of Cassation ruled that the first trial was improperly conducted and ordered a retrial. Found guilty of all charges, Ibrahim was once again sentenced to seven years.
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