Cairo "This is your father, Muadh, your father," Rufaida exclaimed as she pushed her six-year-old son to a young man with his hair even though he was still in his mid-fourth decade, tears flowing in his eyes as he embraced his son, whom he sees for the first time since his imprisonment six years ago, and childish joy jumping in the child's eyes as he felt his father's face for the first time.

This was not the only case in the visiting hall of Borg El Arab prison (west of Alexandria), as Rufaida tells Al Jazeera Net, as the scene was repeated in front of her in the prison yard between sons and fathers who see each other for the first time.

After nine years of detention, Thaer saw his father, whom he had been hearing about, for the first time face to face, realized that he had been prevented from his father by barbed wire for reasons that his early childhood did not understand, and now understands what those walls mean.

Some of the families of the detainees who were transferred from #سجن_بدر٣ to #وادي_النطرون and #سجن_بدر١ prison were able to visit their families after the interruption of the visit to them since their transfer to Badr 3 prison.
Praise be to God for reassuring the families of Ali Zwehem, we call on the Ministry of Interior to stop abusing prisoners in Badr 3 and open the prison for visits and allow the entry of medicines

— Until the Last Prisoner | Till The Last Prisoner (@SajeenSiyasy) March 25, 2023

Dawn of New Hope

Over the past two days, chants of ecstasy mixed with sorrow have erupted on social media, following the circulation of news of the opening of visits to prisoners who have spent several years without a visit, so that their families are no longer working, whether they are alive or dead.

Most of these prisoners were in Badr 3 maximum security prison (northeast of Cairo), and were distributed to the prisons of Wadi al-Natrun, Gamasa and Borg al-Arab in the north, and Minya in the south, where these prisoners were able to communicate with the outside world for the first time.

Within hours, cars were dripping into those prisons, burdened with the grief of hundreds of families who had missed their husbands and children who had been in prison for several years, with no news about them and no hope of their release.

"It's like quenching after thirst, followed by a feeling of fear of running out of water without duration," summed up the writings of a number of families after these sudden short visits, expressing their fear that opening visits would be just a temporary breakthrough.

None of those going to visit was confident of the possibility of happening, "it was like a gamble", in the words of Aya Ahmed in her speech to Al Jazeera Net, which has been echoing on her way to try to visit her husband praying that God does not deprive her of seeing him and checking on him, after years do not mention the number of deprivation of the visit, and in the end she returned without seeing him, or knowing whether he had been transferred or not.

Fatima (wife of detainee Khaled Hamdi)

After the completion of nine years of detention for my husband and with the beginning of the tenth year and deprivation of visitation for 7 years in #العقرب prison and then #بدر3, God's will for reunion to be reunited in a few minutes between me and my husband and my children on a visit after his transfer to Rehabilitation Prison 5 in Wadi Al-Natroun.#FreeThemAll pic.twitter.com/o2yAWKgdUC

— Ramy Mahmoud  (@romyo25jan) March 26, 2023

Explanations

Lawyer and human rights defender Ahmed Helmy explains the sudden breakthrough as being driven by "exceptional decisions that were the result of pressure from the detainees themselves."

He explained in his speech to Al Jazeera Net that "protests took place recently in prisons with the aim of obtaining the rights prescribed for prisoners, including the right to visit, exercise and treatment," and it was not possible to verify the validity of those protests.

There is another explanation for the state of détente, mentioned to Al Jazeera Net human rights sources, that the authority decided to loosen the grip after what grew to the knowledge of senior officials of the truth of what is happening in the prison "Badr 3", and order the distribution of non-dangerous prisoners to other prisons, while the authorities kept others requires their punishment to keep them in prison under specific conditions applicable to the prison "Badr 3".

This account is indicative of the good treatment of prisoners' families during their reception during the visit, and the prisoners in their new prisons were given all their rights.

The validity of this account is supported by human rights reports confirming that "the search was very sophisticated, and the treatment of the soldiers was very respectful," according to the account of the wife of a detainee mentioned in the report of the Egyptian Network for Human Rights (based in London), where the wife and others were surprised to be allowed to visit their imprisoned relatives, who were prevented from visiting them for years without the basis of the law.

Correctional centers, not prisons

In a statement, ANHRI praised the decision of security officials at the Badr Center for Reform and Rehabilitation to open visits to all and the good treatment received by the families of the detainees.

ANHRI statement called on the Egyptian security authorities to continue opening the door for visits, and to treat the inmates as well as their families during the visits.

The ANHRA statement also called on the Egyptian security authorities to open visits and allow the families of detainees in Badr 3 and other prisons, who have been deprived of visits for years, to see their detained relatives and check on them, similar to what happened in Badr 1.

A joint statement by several human rights organizations warned the Egyptian authorities of what it described as "collective punishment in Badr 3 prison", and demanded that the International Committee of the Red Cross and independent human rights organizations be allowed to inspect the Badr prison complex.

The Prisons Organization Act includes the right of prisoners to visit twice a month and to correspond, but at the same time sets out the conditions of prohibition in article 42, which states that "visits may be strictly prohibited or restricted in relation to the circumstances at certain times, for health or security reasons."

The Egyptian authorities approved a plan to liquidate old prisons, especially those located in the center of cities and occupy privileged locations, and the plan included the construction of many new prisons called correction and rehabilitation centers, in light of the national strategy announced two years ago for human rights.