Today is the international day of remembrance for journalists and writers which are detained or have been murdered. And there is really a need for such a day: The “Press Freedom Barometer” of Reporters without Borders alone counts 81 killed and 131 detainded journalists – as well as 64 arrested “cyberdissidents”, often bloggers.
And the Reporters without Borders’ list only counts the continuing cases – many short arrestings, which often do not become known before the victims are released, are not in the index.
Today I especially want to remind of the Egyptian blogger Kareem Amer, who is now arrested for more than a year – and will, as it seems, not be freed before a three years time. On November 6 last year he was being taken into custody for a critical blog post. This February, he was sentenced to four years in prison for defaming Islam as well as president Mubarak, what made him the first Egyptian Blogger being sent to jail for his writings.
Eventhough Kareem has never confirmed his extreme critic on Islam several times, a group of friends – which may not even share his views – fights for him and his freedom of expression. On the first anniversary of Kareem’s detention, the site FreeKareem.org called for demonstrations and saw people protesting in 14 cities all over the world, demanding freedom for Kareem as well as freedom of expression.
But against all international protests and the high publicity in the media for this case it has now become known that Kareem had to experience physical torture in prison:
- Being beaten inside ward Number 22 where he is imprisoned at the time of the assault, the battery was launched by another prisoner and a prison guard, in the presence of Officer Midhat Samir and under his supervision. Samir also gave the green light for the assault which resulted in a broken tooth “upper right canine tooth” along with a number of bruises and abrasions on various parts of the body.
- Transferring Karim to a disciplinary cell where he was handcuffed and had his feet strapped into shackles; he was beaten up again which caused him more injuries.
- Another inmate prisoner was brought over where they stripped him out of clothes and beat him severely in front of prisoner Kareem Soliman as they also threatened to inflict upon him the same punishment, if he didn’t mind his own business.
Torture is nothing extra ordinal in Egypt: The country, which Reporters without Borders count as one the internet’s enemies and rank it as #146 in this year’s Press Freedom Index, frequently attracts attention caused by “vanished” people – often bloggers – and torture in it’s prisons and police stations, hitting the top this year with the case of a 12 year old boy tortured to death by policemen.
Especially with these bad news back in mind I want to remind of Kareem – as a symbol for all those many other bloggers, writers and journalists, which become arrested, tortured and killed for political reasons all over the world.
Similarly, I want to remind of the Burmese writers and journalists, which are, because of their participation in this years revolution, suppressed or arrested, like comedian and poet Zargana. The memory as well be for Kenji Nagai, the Japanese photojournalist murdered by the Burmese junta.
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