Confirmed cities so far:
1- Brussels
2- Rome
3- Stockholm
4- Washington DC
5- New York City
6- Prague
7- Bucharest
8- Berlin
9- Amsterdam
10- London
11- Athens
12 – Mexico City
13 – São Paulo
14 – Rio de Janeiro
Interested in organizing a rally in a city that is not yet listed here? Contact us!
For those in the DC area, below is the confirmed information concerning the Free Kareem rally to be held. Please show your support and attend it if you’re anywhere close to this area!
Date: Friday, November 9, 2007
Time: 12:00pm – 1:00pm
Location: Egyptian Embassy Cultural Office (Dupont Circle)
Street: 1303 New Hampshire Ave NW
City/Town: Washington, DC
Message from the organizers:
Regardless of whether you agree with Kareem, we can all agree that no one should be imprisoned for voicing their opinions. We ask only that you join us during your lunch hour to support Kareem and free expression.
Friends of Kareem confirmed that he will start studying for his high school diploma soon. Kareem graduated from an Azhar high school which is only appropriated for admittance into the Alazhar University. His lawyers along with some friends are in the process of finding him the necessary books and documents to complete the first year of school. This will help admit him into other universities in Egypt once he is release from prison.
How can you help?
You can help by sending him notebooks, writing supplies, other useful stationary and encouraging letters to this address.
Student groups of Amnesty International New Zealand have been actively working on Kareem’s case for some time now, featuring him on their Freedom Challenge action page:
Here in New Zealand criticisms of the government and educational institutes are made every day… just listen in to friends and family conversations and you’d be surprised how often those criticisms are made. What won’t surprise you at all is that such comments are made without fear of imprisonment, ill-treatment or torture – a right denied Shi Tao and Abdul Karim Nabeil Suleiman.
Amnesty International considers Abdul’s sentence as “yet another slap in the face of freedom of expression in Egypt,” and considers him to be a prisoner of conscience who is being prosecuted on account of the peaceful expression of his views.” Join Amnesty in calling for Kareem’s immediate and unconditional release.
In a recent e-mail to us, Jay Crangle, a member of the organization, writes:
We are mailing a petition with over 800 signatures to the Interior Minister this week, as well as the diplomatic representative of Egypt accredited to New Zealand.
We would like to thank Amnesty International New Zealand for their consistent efforts concerning Kareem’s case, and hope that they too will be involved in our worldwide rallies.
(Updated)
We have 10 confirmed cities so far that will take place in the worldwide Free Kareem rally on Friday, the 9th of November.
1- Brussels
2- Rome
3- Stockholm
4- Washington DC
5- New York City
6- Prague
7- Bucharest
8- Berlin
9- Amsterdam
10- London
11- Athens
12 – Mexico City
13 – São Paulo
14 – Rio de Janeiro
We are aiming for much more, so if your city is not listed here and you would like to organize one, please contact us!
If you live in any of the above cities, please attend a rally! We will post detailed information concerning exact times, location addresses and the organizers’ contact information. This is just an entry to give you some time to plan ahead.
From Reporters Without Borders:
Government repression no longer ignores bloggers
The Internet is occupying more and more space in the breakdown of press freedom violations. Several countries fell in the ranking this year because of serious, repeated violations of the free flow of online news and information.
In Malaysia (124th), Thailand (135th), Vietnam (162nd) and Egypt (146th), for example, bloggers were arrested and news websites were closed or made inaccessible. “We are concerned about the increase in cases of online censorship,” Reporters Without Borders said. “More and more governments have realised that the Internet can play a key role in the fight for democracy and they are establishing new methods of censoring it. The governments of repressive countries are now targeting bloggers and online journalists as forcefully as journalists in the traditional media.”
At least 64 persons are currently imprisoned worldwide because of what they posted on the Internet. China maintains its leadership in this form of repression, with a total of 50 cyber-dissidents in prison. Eight are being held in Vietnam. A young man known as Kareem Amer was sentenced to four years in prison in Egypt for blog posts criticising the president and Islamist control of the country’s universities.
Read the full report here.
From the Daily Star Egypt:
CAIRO: As the one year anniversary of the detainment of student blogger Kareem Amer approaches, activists of the online campaign Free Kareem Coalition are preparing for a day of worldwide protests in early November in support of the imprisoned cyber dissident.
The anniversary campaign entitled “One Year is Enough” has confirmed demonstrations outside the Egyptian embassies in New York City, Washington DC, Germany, the Netherlands, and in Romania on Nov. 9.
Activists aim, however, to organize rallies in at least 15 cities around the world, including London, Paris, and Stockholm.
“The demonstrations are intended to mark Kareem’s one year in prison. He was detained on Nov. 6, 2006, but the actual sentence wasn’t handed out until three months later. We are planning to organize rallies then too,” Esra’a Al Shafei of the Free Kareem Coalition told Daily News Egypt.
It was in February this year that the 21-year-old former Al-Azhar student was sentenced to four years in prison for insulting Islam and President Hosni Mubarak on his weblog. The case marks the first time Egypt subjects an internet blogger to a prison term and the sentencing has sparked heavy criticism of the Egyptian authorities from human rights groups as well as representatives of foreign governments.
During the first months of Amer’s imprisonment, the Free Kareem Coalition organized numerous rallies for Amer’s release in US and European capitals. The activist group now hopes that the one-year anniversary campaign will help create new momentum in the case.
“Our campaign is already receiving a lot of attention because people are thinking ‘wow, it’s been a year’ since Kareem was sentenced. Most bloggers in the Arab world who get arrested are usually kept in detainment for a few months at the most. Kareem’s case is unique in this regard,” Al Shafei said.
Furthermore, Amer supposedly sent out a new letter from his prison cell a few days ago in which he reflects on his year in detainment and denounces the “enemies of freedom’ who put him in prison.
“I write, with the completion of a ‘whole’ year in prison approaching, with my cuffed freedom and restricted movements. The tough experience pushed me to realize the bitterness of injustice, that indescribable feeling which has no parallel, particularly if applied to a victim who is not guilty. I did nothing but merely practice my legitimate right to [free] speech, guaranteed by all civil and humanitarian rules despite the tyrants who do not approve of it,” the blogger stated, according to the Free Kareem Coalition.
Amer claims that he has not been allowed to use pens in prison until recently which forced him to previously dictate his letters.
He is now, however, allegedly allowed to “write and exchange mails” although his letters are “subject to censorship”.
“Kareem can send and receive letters but not all packages reach him; especially books,” Al Shafei added.
Fellow Egyptian blogger Shahinaz notes in an e-mail to us that Kareem received two visits in prison: one from Gamal Eid, executive director of the Arabic Network for Human Rights Information, and the other from Howaida Taha, an Al Jazeera documentary maker who was briefly arrested in Egypt due to her video footage on police torture. Her husband accompanied her to this visit.
Kareem was also supposed to receive a brief visit from Sarah, a friend who lives in Alexandria and who lives not far from him, but unfortunately the prison guards refused her entry because Kareem had already received visits during the week from Shahinaz, Howaida, and Gamal and it is not possible to accept more within such a short time span.
Kareem is glad that he is still receiving support internationally. He continues to receive letters from abroad from people who participate in our letter-writing campaign. If you haven’t sent a letter to Kareem yet, please take the time to do so, as it is the best way to help keep him hopeful and in high spirits.
Don’t forget to spread the word about our worldwide rallies on the 9th of November (NOT the 6th!)
If you want to get involved, please do contact us.
The day for the Free Kareem rallies (to take place worldwide) is nearing. We need your help!
We have five confirmed locations so far:
- New York City
- Romania
- Germany
- Washington, DC
- The Netherlands
Help us organize 10 more! There will most likely be on in London, France, Belgium, and Sweden. They are still unconfirmed locations, but if you are willing to organize a rally in your city please do, and contact us for any details!
We will be posting the contact information of these organizers very shortly.
Until then, please download these flyers and place them around your campus or wherever else you think is approrpriate:
If you can’t see, this is what it says on the bottom of the flyer, next to “why you should support Kareem“:
The theme of the worldwide rallies is “One year is enough!” since it will mark Kareem’s one year imprisonment. Remember that although he was officially sentenced on the 22nd of Feburary, he has been imprisoned since the 6th of November. We are holding the rallies on the 9th of November however, so do not get confused! This is to ensure that all students can also show up to the rallies, which (it not on Fridays) they cannot do due to classes or office hours.
Below you will find a translation of the 6th letter Kareem sent from prison. The Arabic version is available here.
I write, while the completion of a “whole” year in prison approaches, with my cuffed freedom and restricted movements. The tough experience pushed me to realize the bitterness of injustice that indescribable feeling which has no resemblance, particularly if applied on a victim that committed no guilt. I did nothing but merely practicing my legitimate right to speech, guaranteed by all civil and humanitarian rules despite the tyrants who do not approve it.
Apparently, a quite long time has passed since the day of unjustly sentencing me to four years in prison. Until recently, I was not able to comment on the event because I had no access to media and I was deprived from exchanging mails or talking. I spent more than two months in the cells dedicated to those sentenced to death and serving punitive penalties. The prison officials claimed that there was no other proper place for me. They prevented me from having pens. Whenever I wanted to write a letter, I had no choice but to dictate it!
Now, things have changed greatly. At least, I can write and exchange mails, not with complete freedom though. My letters unlike the letters of other prisoners are subject to censorship. However, the prison officials deny that any of the letters coming to me is confiscated. They confirm that they send them to me after reading the content regardless of content. Therefore, I found it a good opportunity to talk after a long period of forced silence and staying away from those who “invested” my crisis – according to my Tunisian friend, Emad Habib – because they do not deserve my slightest attention.
I still clearly remember that day. I prepared myself, psychologically, to the final session of announcing the judgement. I did not care for the expected sentence, then. I was preoccupied with history and the anniversary that coincided that day. History repeats itself all the time; yesterday, today, and tomorrow are all alike. My final judgement session was held on February 22nd the day that I can never forget.
On the same day forty six years ago – particularly in February 22nd, 1943 – a military court in Germany headed by a “racist” judge sentenced three University of Munich students to death. They are the brothers Sofia and Hans Scholl and their friend Christoph Probst. They were punished because they dared to confront the fascist regime in a non-violent way. They established a resistance movement against the ruling regime. They called it “White Rose Movement.” Their peaceful activism, for which they were executed, was limited to confronting the ruling fascist regime by simple tools like drawing on street walls at night, writing and distributing street bulletins, with the purpose to expose the inhuman crimes against ethnic and religious minorities in Germany. They used to distribute their bulletins inside the campus; computers and blogging was not known for them.
Sixty-four years later, a “tyrant” judge in an Egyptian court, motivated by Al-Azhar University, sentenced me to four years in prison because I practiced my right to free speech online. Al-Azhar University released me recently by expelling me out and I am still paying for this freedom.
I am not trying to compare myself to those brave heroes; I just wanted to focus on the historical coincidence. The blogger friend, Shahinaz mentioned in one of her letters that “tyrants and dictators looks alike in every place and time” However, I was preoccupied by the situation of university in both cases. At that time, University of Munich took the initiative to expel the three students out and handled them to the Gestapo. At this time, Al-Azhar University took the initiative of expelling me out, then informed the prosecutor with my activities… No comment!
Every day in the morning, I find an urge need inside my mind to think of my current situation, as if I am discovering it for the first time. I ask myself many questions with hope to find appropriate answers to justify my current situation. I am detained with dangerous criminals who resemble danger against individuals and properties. I tried to find convincing answers for my questions. At a certain moment, I decided to abandon logical thinking. I decided to look for a good interpretation based on the prevailing inherited concepts of inhuman characteristics and which are mostly related to our miserable facts.
I found out that the accusations levelled against me, regardless of its legal paraphrasing, can be divided into two sections:
A total section related to using my right to free expression in an unfree climate and daring to exceed social, political, and religious limits and redlines.
A detailed section, which can be summarized in the following points:
First: my absolute rejection of violence, particularly that hidden under religious covers and justified by Quran texts, which lost their value by time.
Second: using my mind to analyze the unseen and unbelievable facts derived from religious superstitious heritage.
Third: my rejection to be classified according to any affiliations imposed forcefully on me because I decided not adopt something which does not express what I feel.
Fourth: I believe naively that I live in a democratic free atmosphere and that I enjoy my basic civil rights, including my absolute right to free expression in addition to the aforementioned points. I did not realize the bitter fact that I live under the rule of repressive regime chasing those who have different opinions.
Fifth: Bending myself to frankness and transparency in expressing my views. For example, I am not disguised behind a false name and had been able to do so. It was evident during the investigations conducted by Disciplinary Council of Al-Azhar University and the Public Prosecutor. I think this is the real reason behind everything that happened to me so far.
I think these are the true accusations leveled against me. Things will not change as long as our country does not change. These days, we cannot neglect the tyrant judgment against columnist and poet, Ahmed Abdel Muti Hijazi who was charged with defamation against a mohatasib. He simply talked about religious fundamentalism in one of his articles published in Rosalyousif newspaper, few years ago. He compared between political Islamists and inquisition courts in the Middle Age and Israeli religious extremists who insist that their country is a religious one.
Al-Azhar University is currently planning for a new conspiracy against freedom of thought and expression against Ph.D. Dr. Mahmoud Al-Khayal. He mentioned a TV show that he wants to translate an American book titled “End of Faith” into Arabic. Now, the supporters of retardation are preparing to chase him with the charge of disdaining Islam like what happened with me.
I announce from her that my accusation is not a shame for me. I have it like a crown on my head and necklace on my chest. Every one must know that I did not force myself to respect any tyrant law that hinders freedoms. I am against any act to limit the right of freedom of expression of any person. Laws were created to regulate the relationships between individuals inside the same society. They are not meant to limit their freedoms and violate their basic rights. It is not logic to say that: “… there are limitations on the right to freedom of expression …” according to those who work against freedom. These limitations, according to them, include justifying suppression and intellectual circumcision supported by shallow-minded fundamentalists who cannot go abreast with the modern age.
Let everyone, including the tyrant judges who sentenced me and those who misused my crisis to get me, know that prison will not work out with me. I do believe in myself, respect my right to free thought and expression, and use their minds all the time. My thoughts which deprived them of night sleep, will not change until I get convinced of other thoughts. Terrifying and intimidating me, expelling me out of university and putting me in prison will not change my mind. Also, inciting people to kill me and claiming hisba cases against me and any other barbarian methods will not panic me. Only stupid, weak, and inflexible people use these methods to justify their violent actions by breaking the pencils of writers and silencing their voices. They cannot achieve what they want.
I do not know how to address Al-Azhar University that led me to jail, the tyrant judges who sentenced me to prison, and the leaders of the repressive regime who are preventing us from breathing. The best message I want to deliver to them is quoted from the young Sofia Scholl who were in my age at the time of her execution. She said to the judge who sentenced her to death: “One day, you will be at my place!” This happened.
To the enemies of freedom, tyrants, and authoritarians, heads of religious institutions, officials of the governing regime and their supporters, I say:
“The garbage of history will be stuffed with you soon. The coming generations will not have mercy with you. They will do as I am doing now. They will curse you. Please, make sure that no one will shed a tear for your sake, because you do not deserve it. Tomorrow is ours. It does not matter how tyrant you are in your attempts to silence us and confiscate our views. You should be aware for our revival because your days are counting down. Your dark night approached its end. Our dawn will come up very soon. Tomorrow is ours.”
Abdel Kareem Nabil Soliman
To read all previous letters, click here.
“You can cage the singer but not the song.” – Harry Belafonte, in International Herald Tribune, 3 October 1988
