Amnesty Mohammed El-Sharkawi Prisoner of Conscious

On Tuesday was the regular local Amnesty International meeting. As this is one of the passions that my better half and myself share, it enables us to share some time together too. While K has much more experience of working with another AI group, I have a lifetime immersed in the political geography of our planet. So while I have supported Amnesty International from a distance I have never become involved with an active group before. However, together we complement each other well, and my rigorous research abilities mean that I can help depth of understanding that means we gain a greater understanding of what lays behind the abuses of human rights that are central to the campaign work of Amnesty.

The last meeting we attended, the first for me, we were told about the prisoner of conscious who the local group are concentrated upon getting justice for. However as a very independent minded Wood Mouse, I wanted to look further into the details of the case in question. While I fully respect the integrity of Amnesty, I would prefer to ensure that I am not campaigning for the rights of a mass murderer without knowing that.

Also as Mohammed El-Sharkawi, the prisoner of conscious in question, is from Egypt I also wanted to understand what is happening in the country too.

What my own independent research uncovered has been shocking. It alarms me that the media are mainly ignoring the situation in Egypt. It appears that as Egypt is allied to the west, the regular and systematic abuse of human rights is ignored. Further, the government as a friend of the west, is allowed to abuse its people in a way that would be generating masses of condemnation were it a state and a government that was hostile to the west and western interests.

Therefore the presence of the Suez Canal and the strategic economic interests this represents to the west, that is allowing the Egyptian government to abuse the human rights of its people with impunity. Add to this the Egyptian role in the so called war on terrorism, and there appears to be a justification for the abusing other people. But as history shows, the more human rights are abused, the greater the chance that oppressed people will turn to violence. Put most simply the abuse of Human rights and injustice is the recruitment Sargent for terrorism.

However, just labelling a group as terrorist does not make them terrorists. Far to often that label is applied to any group that opposes a government and in Egypt where opposition to the Mubarak regime is treated as a criminal offence, then it is far to easy for Egypt to abuse its population and to hide this oppression as the Vail of stopping terrorism. Also in Egypt the army has many economic interests and one of the ways that army businesses prevent competition is by harassing and arresting their competitor.

Therefore while the country is a complex mixture of a repressive regime and a large army, it also has a large population of very poor people that is growing by a million people per year. In to this mixture there is a degree of militant Islam. Not least because of the oppression of the Palestinian people in Gaza and the Egyptian governments assistance in that.

So while any government has the need to stop terrorists and prevent violence on the streets, it has to be carried out via an open and fair justice system. No justice system is perfect but if justice is seen to be just and fair then there are less chances for abuses. We only need to look at the shameful period of Guantanamo Bay to see that. Holding people just because you suspect they are guilty can never be enough to justify a detention. Any evidence of their guilt has to be tested.

When people are held without trial it increases the rage within the population. I can remember incidences in Britain where this has happened and it has lead to violent protests in the streets here. Even in Burma, they understand this and while the show trial of Aung San Suu Kyi was fixed, the Burmese Generals knew that creating the appearance of a “Fair Trial” was an important symbol.

However for Mohammed El-Sharkawi, the Egyptian prisoner of conscious in question has had none of this. He has been held since 1995 without charge or trial under emergency legislation introduced in 1967. As I have argued here previously regarding legislation that removes civil liberalities here in Britain, while it may be introduced to deal with a real threat or legitimate reasons, it (the legislation or emergency powers) are kept and abused as they are far to easily used for purposes other than intended.

Mohammed El-Sharkawi refutes any involvement in the attempted assassination that he is accused of, and has suffered torture and ill treatment. As with any prisoner he needs to have a fair trial or be released. The Egyptian courts have even ordered his release, twice, but the prison authorities, the government and the army ignore these judicial orders. Further, he is refused the medical treatment he needs, and that to me is reason enough to campaign for his release.

I will be writing to the Egyptian authorities using the standard letter available from the Amnesty International web site. I hope there will be a reader or two here who will do the same.

However, before I close this posting, when I started looking into this case, I carried out a Google search. To discover greater understanding and try to uncover more of the background story. What I found was truly shocking. It is clear that Mohammed El-Sharkawi is not an uncommon name in Egypt as I found reports of another man, younger then the prisoner of conscious the local Amnesty group have adopted to campaign on his behalf, who has also suffered torture and ill treatment in Egypt. Here are links to his story too. And Here And Here

Personally I feel a little ashamed that I did not know more about the abuses of human rights that are happening in Egypt. If I want to know about some C list celebrity the media are full of it, but real news, or campaigning journalism appears to be moribund here. Equally I ashamed that our government who started in power saying they would have an “Ethical Foreign Policy” should have not allowed these abuses in Egypt to go unnoticed and uncommented upon.