Despite the warnings, an Egyptian journalist died as a result of the cold and medical neglect in Scorpion Prison

Abdul Rahman Mohammed - Al Jazeera Net

The arrested journalist, Mahmoud Abdel Magid Mahmoud Saleh, died yesterday evening inside his cell in a heavily guarded Tora 1 prison known as Scorpio (south of Cairo), as a result of deliberate medical neglect, cold and hunger, according to human rights sources.

The sources reported that the deceased detainee Mahmoud Abdul Majeed, 46, who supports a family of 5, was serving a life sentence, and his mother died in 2015 of grief and pain.

Mahmoud Abdul-Majid al-Akbar was among his brothers, working in the field of media, printing and publishing, as well as a sportsman and scout leader.

The human rights sources accused the detective officer in Scorpion Muhammad Shaheen of being responsible for the death of Abdul Majeed, while human rights activists called for an investigation into the circumstances of his death, as his health condition was not during the past days as bad as the death.

Jurist researcher Ahmed Al-Attar says that this situation occurs despite international convictions, human rights reports and the detainees' inquiries during the trial sessions, and despite successive campaigns to warn of this fate that affected the detainee, Mahmoud Abdel-Majid.

In his interview with Al-Jazeera Net, he indicated that the death of Mahmoud Abdel-Majid was shocking to everyone, but it is an inevitable and realistic result of what is happening. What is expected for more than a thousand detainees who were deprived of everything in a siege that is the most painful and brutal?

Al-Attar believes that all Egyptian state agencies participate in what happens to detainees in Scorpio, where they use all possible and natural means such as cold and frost to kill them, and "Mahmoud Abdel Majid's crime was not the first and will not be the last."

The death comes despite successive campaigns to warn of deteriorating conditions in Egyptian prisons in general, and Scorpion prison in particular, and in continuation of what Egyptian and international human rights organizations called "the phenomenon of deliberate medical neglect", where human rights activists documented the death of about 30 people during the past year in prisons as a result of medical neglect.

Egyptian activists and human rights activists launched the "Cold Pinch Scorpion" campaign, which started Friday 3 January and continues for 10 days, in solidarity with Scorpion detainees, in light of the multiple violations they faced, which were exacerbated by the cold winter and the harsh nature of the prison.

Jurists revealed that the Egyptian authorities have implemented, during the past few days, extensive abstraction campaigns that have affected the various holdings of detainees, foremost of which are winter clothing and blankets, and it is only allowed to keep light and low-level prison clothes.

According to international and local human rights bodies, the Tora Prison is very guarded, known as Scorpio, one of the worst Egyptian prisons, and it witnesses continuous and chronic violations and abuses represented in preventing the visit and not allowing the entry of personal hygiene drugs or possessions, as well as arbitrary measures taken from time to time.