Telegraph: Egyptian bloggers growing bolder
May 6th, 2007Here’s a good compendium of Egypt’s recent crackdown on bloggers: Egypt’s blog rebels silenced by jail.
In recent months, the Egyptian regime has jailed several bloggers, ending a period in which it had taken a more relaxed attitude towards internal critics. Human rights activists claim the about-turn follows the US administration’s decision to relax pressure on Middle Eastern governments to enact democratic reforms.
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In February, Abdel Kareem Nabil, 22, a former student at Egypt’s Islamic Al Azhar University, was jailed for four years for insulting Islam and Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, on his blog.
advertisementLast month, another popular and outspoken blogger from the banned Muslim Brotherhood, Abdel Monem Mahmoud, was thrown into Egypt’s notorious Tora prison, where he remains today.
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Initial ambivalence on the part of government security agents changed in November, said Mr Zarwan, when a cellular phone video appeared on dozens of Egyptian blogs showing two police officers apparently sodomising a detainee with a rod. A public outcry ensued and the officers are being tried for torture.
Hossam Hamalawy, who writes a Cairo-based blog called 3Arabawy, said that, despite the crackdown, the bloggers are growing bolder.
“Some people are intimidated but overall it’s producing the opposite effect,” he said. “It is radicalising the blogosphere even more. We have bloggers joining every day.”
May 22nd, 2007 at 1:47 pm
I respect bloggers and i support them and i all the way with them , But i wish they stopped insulting islam , just to sound cool and have westerners Praise them. Grow up guys , yes you can talk reforms, and progress without insulting the religion that means a lot to over a billion muslims . they can remain respectful to islam and that all we ask them to do .