Egyptian fear in the blogosphere -

Egypt has once again been cracking down on freedoms of expression in cyberspace and recently arrested a 22-year-old law student blogger, Abdol Karim, for being critical of Islam in his posts.

Mr Karim, known in the blogosphere as Kareem Amer, was detained on November 6 in his home city of Alexandria. A website has been set up to campaign for his release.

Amnesty International has been campaigning against online censorship and the jailing of bloggers around the world. Reporters Without Borders has responded to Mr Karim’s case with scathing criticism, and, at the weekend, a string of Egyptian human rights organisations condemned his incarceration.

According to reports, Mr Karim has been charged with several offences, including defaming the president of Egypt, incitement to overthrow the regime and incitement to hate Islam.

Alaa Abd el-Fatah, another blogger detained by the Egyptian authorities earlier this year, and later freed, says that the jailing of Mr Karim is much more troubling because he has been targeted for his religious views.

Reporters Without Borders says that earlier this year Mr Karim was expelled from his university, the Islamic University of al-Azhar for criticising the Egyptian government’s “religious and authoritarian excesses”.

Campaigners for Mr Karim have said it is particularly worrying that the university was involved in trying to stop Mr Karim’s blogging.