International reporting
Egypt: relatives of Alaa Abdel Fattah still hope for his soon release
Audio 02:24
Alaa Abdel Fattah behind bars to hear the verdict of the Assize Court.
He was sentenced to 5 years in prison for violating the legislation governing demonstrations.
AFP PHOTO / KHALED DESOUKI
By: Edouard Dropsy
3 mins
The icon of the Egyptian Revolution, Alaa Abdel Fattah, has been on a hunger strike for more than two months after being sentenced to five years in prison by a special court last December.
Although his conditions of detention seem to have improved, his relatives continue to demand his release.
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From our correspondent in Cairo,
"
This is the first letter sent since he left Scorpion
."
Alaa Abdel Fattah was recently transferred from Tora prison nicknamed Scorpion, the worst in Egypt, to a so-called model prison.
His mother, Laïla Seïf was able to hear from him: “
For the first time in three years, he sleeps on a mattress, he receives books and has the right to read them.
»
After spending five years in prison from 2014 to 2019 for participating in a protest, Alaa was released.
Then arrested again six months later for a tweet.
Definitively sentenced to five years in prison for spreading false news, he started a hunger strike two months ago.
“
Even if I wanted to discuss my fear or whether I am okay with it, how can he live under these conditions?
Of course I have to support him and I do,
says his mother
.
I know that if he is released he will be able to take control of his life.
Maybe not in Egypt, no, I don't think that's possible.
»
Leave Egypt.
For the United Kingdom surely, of which he has just acquired the nationality.
If there were precedents for the release of dual nationals, these were preventive.
Mohamed Anwar el-Sadat, the president of the National Council for Human Rights remains cautious: “
As you know, Alaa has been sentenced, so we have to wait.
»
Signs of openness
But for the nephew of the former raïs, signs of openness are encouraging: “
We must be tenacious.
I believe that when the president calls for a national dialogue, that's the type of recognition for the regime that it's time to calm things down.
»
In a country with at least 60,000 political prisoners, the situation is far from resolved.
For Mohamed Lotfi, the director of ECRF, one of the last human rights associations in Egypt, the release of Alaa Abel Fatah could be a path to change.
“
Alaa is an active person who represents the symbol of freedom, of hope.
An indication or a clue that would show that we are going in the right direction would be to free Alaa.
Freeing Alaa would give this signal to everyone that we are opening a new page.
Without the release of Alaa, people will not want to believe it
.
»
Although all free speech is prohibited in this dictatorship, Egyptian society is not fooled.
She is worried about a food crisis in the making and which could create social tensions.
► Read also: Egypt's most famous political detainee, Alaa Abdel Fattah, begins a hunger strike
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Egypt
Human rights
Justice