Egypt: Halt Executions of Six Men

[Jefferson23]

Convicted in Military Court After Unfair Trial

April 4, 2015

(New York) – Six men face execution in Egypt after being convicted by a military court, despite evidence that some were in detention at the time of the crimes. Egyptian authorities should stay the executions and send the men’s case for retrial before a civilian court, Human Rights Watch said.

The six men are part of a group of nine convicted in a single trial of participating in attacks on security forces and killing two armed forces officers in a shootout in 2014. Two of the nine men were sentenced to life in prison. Another man was tried and convicted in his absence and sentenced to death. Defense Minister Sedki Sobhi confirmed all seven death sentences on March 24, 2015, following the rejection of a legally required appeal from prosecutors, putting the six men in custody at risk of execution at any time.

“Egypt’s courts have routinely abandoned due process, but if these executions go ahead it will represent an egregious new low,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director. “Civilians should never face trial before military courts or face execution as a result.”

Military prosecutors accused the nine men of belonging to the Egyptian insurgent group Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, or Partisans of Jerusalem, and of participating in attacks on security forces, including a gunfight on March 19, 2014, in Arab Sharkas, a village north of Cairo, which killed an armed forces brigadier general and colonel. The Arab Sharkas gun battle occurred when police, military, and special forces raided a timber workshop in the village, in the Qalyubiya governorate, which they believed the jihadist group used, the Associated Press reported at the time.

http://www.hrw.org/news/2015/04/04/egypt-halt-executions-six-men