Issue No. 603
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12 - 18 September 2002 Issue No. 603 Home news |
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Recommend this page | ||
Tough sentencing for some
The military trial of 94 Islamists charged with assassinating top officials and aiding Hamas and Chechen fighters finally came to an end on Monday. Khaled Dawoud was there
The longest military trial to be held in recent years finally came to a close on Monday. Of the 94 persons on trial, alleged members of a previously unheard of group, dubbed Al-Waad [the Promise], military judges sentenced 51 to prison terms ranging between two and 15 years, and acquitted 43. Three defendants were sentenced to 15 years, three to seven years, 14 to five years, 24 to three years and two to two years. Six were tried in absentia, one of them receiving an acquittal while the others were sentenced to three years.
The majority of the defendants were arrested in May last year, and they were originally charged with illegally raising funds to support the militant Palestinian group, Hamas, and the Chechen separatists fighting against Russia. Several opposition papers at that time expressed dismay over the arrest of people primarily on charges of raising funds to support Palestinians at a time when most political parties and many civil society organisations were engaged in the same activity, having begun fundraising when the Al-Aqsa Intifada erupted in September 2000.
The decision to refer the defendants to court was only announced in mid-October 2001, barely a month after the 11 September attacks in New York and Washington. Then new and more serious, charges were added, including plotting to assassinate top government officials, key ministers, the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Sheikh Mohamed Sayed Tantawi and leading secular feminist writer Nawal Saadawi. The men were also charged with sending members of the organisation to Chechnya to receive military training to prepare them to carry out terrorist attacks in Egypt with the charges citing plans to blow up the television building in downtown Cairo.
Their lawyers cried foul and charged that their clients were the victims of the so-called US war on terror. They were particularly critical of the fact that the defendants were referred to military court where sentences cannot be appealed and are subject to ratification by the president. Lawyers said military courts have been reserved for armed militant organisations and leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood group since the early 1990s, while their clients were not involved in any acts of violence.
The defendants included two prominent preachers who were popular for their weekly sermons. Sheikh Nashaat Ibrahim, who preached at a mosque in Nasr City, ironically named Kabul, and Sheikh Fawzi Sayed, who preached at Al-Fateh mosque downtown, were both charged with establishing and leading the previously unknown group.
To the surprise of their lawyers, they were both acquitted while other defendants accused mainly of joining the organisation received prison terms. "How come you acquit the supposed leaders and condemn the rest of the members? That is surprising," said Ayman El-Sayed, a lawyer who attended the session.
Among the defendants, there were also three citizens from the Russian republic of Daghestan, a Yemeni of Palestinian origin and four Egyptians who also hold either Dutch, German, American or Canadian citizenship. Three Egyptian students who received training several years ago in the United States to fly commercial planes were also among the defendants, fuelling allegations that the case was linked to the post-9/11 security climate.
Hardly anyone was happy among the scores of family-members who gathered outside of the Haikstep military camp where the trial has been held during the past nine months. "My son was acquitted, but I feel very sad for the others," said the father of one of the defendants. "I am also very angry because my son had to spend a year and half in prison for no reason except to satisfy America and to prove to it that our government is also fighting against terrorists."
Only a few lawyers and journalists were allowed inside the courtroom, while relatives were forced to wait outside for hours in hope that the lawyers would come out to tell them about the sentences. But few lawyers came out to speak to them, and an unlucky reporter working for an American news agency who had the information on the sentences was bombarded with questions by defendants' family-members. Some of them went as far as to kneel down to kiss the reporters hand to encourage her to read out the rulings issued against their loved ones.
The session to announce the rulings and sentences was very brief. Three judges in military uniform entered the huge courtroom, and the chief judge quickly read out the rulings and sentences in a low voice. There was no immediate reaction among the defendants. They did not chant any anti-government slogans, as their main concern was to obtain confirmation from their lawyers about the sentences. The few reporters who attended the closing session were not allowed to speak to the defendants as they were quickly whisked away back to prison under heavy police protection.
"This is unfair," said one young woman wearing the niqab, a black dress and head covering that conceals the entire body with only a small opening revealing the eyes. Her husband, Alaa Zeid, was sentenced to three years imprisonment, leaving her alone to raise three children. "These people are in prison because they were committed to their faith and were seeking to support Palestine. How could supporting Palestine be a charge? All the other charges of plotting to kill officials are untrue," she said while weeping hysterically.
Deliberations in the Al-Waad case concluded in early March and the court was scheduled to issue its rulings in early April. But that period coincided with the massive operation led by Israel in the occupied Palestinian territories, Code-named Defensive Shield. Huge demonstrations took place throughout Egypt, and authorities apparently felt it would be unwise to announce the rulings against defendants accused of supporting Palestinians. A new date was set in early June, but it too was postponed after one of the defendants was arrested in the former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan and handed over to Egypt. The court reopened the case to allow the lawyers of Abdel-Rahman Fakhri, who holds Egyptian and Canadian citizenship, to defend him.
Lawyers differed in their assessment of the rulings. "The sentences are very harsh," said Islamist lawyer Montasser El- Zayyat. "The defendants were not involved in carrying out a single violent act in Egypt; they were simply accused of planning things. They did not deserve this."
However, Mamdouh Ismail, another lawyer, expressed satisfaction with the outcome. "The court acquitted a large number of defendants, and this has never happened before in a military court," he told Al-Ahram Weekly.
The Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights (EOHR) issued a statement on Monday reaffirming its opposition to trying civilians in front of military courts. It appealed to the president not to ratify the sentences and to order a retrial in front of a civilian court.
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