Despite our efforts to gain their attention and support for Kareem in the past 2 years, the UN has been largely unresponsive. Two years later UN “experts” condemn Kareem’s imprisonment, but where was the UN 2 years ago when we needed them, and why did the UN continue to support and promote Egypt’s place in the Human Rights Council despite knowledge of Kareem’s arrest and other bloggers/activists like him?

From Amnesty:

Experts of the Human Rights Council have concluded that the Egyptian authorities have detained blogger Karim Amer arbitrarily for his online criticisms and for exercising his right to freedom of expression. The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (WGAD) communicated its decision to Amnesty International.

[...]

Karim Amer was sentence in 2007 to four years in prison for writing on his blog criticizing Egypt’s al-Azhar religious authorities and President Mubarak. Charges against him include “spreading information disruptive of public order and damaging to the country’s reputation”, “incitement to hate Islam” and “defaming the President of the Republic”.

Read full release.

This is the video we created two years ago opposing Egypt’s inclusion in the Human Rights Council:

Joel Simon, Executive Director of the Committee to Protect Journalists, writes a letter to President Hosni Mubarak condemning the state’s oppression against bloggers, noting Kareem amongst those abused by the government for their blogging:

Dear Mr. President,

The Committee to Protect Journalists is writing to protest the relentless campaign of persecution against Internet journalists and bloggers by Egypt’s various security services. Regrettably, the routine harassment and detention of bloggers, according to CPJ research, is only one element of an overall decline in press freedom in Egypt in recent years. In 2007, CPJ concluded that Egypt was among the 10 worst backsliders in terms of press freedom worldwide, due to a massive number of legal proceedings being launched against critical journalists. Since then, this trend has continued unabated with hundreds of lawsuits, criminal complaints, and summonses being issued against editors, reporters, bloggers, and free expression advocates.

[...]

CPJ research also shows that at least three bloggers remain in administrative detention, held without charge under the Emergency Law, or are serving prison sentences.

Abdel Karim Suleiman, widely known as Karim Amer, was arrested in November 2006 for writing critical articles about prominent religious figures and the president of the republic. He was convicted in February 2007 of insulting religion and the president, and is currently serving a four-year jail term for both charges. He is the only Egyptian blogger to ever be convicted for his online writings. Since then Amer has been mistreated in prison. In November 2007 he was severely beaten by another prisoner and a guard, according to his lawyer and to multiple local human rights groups. He was prevented from documenting his injuries in a medical report, local human rights organizations widely reported. In August 2008, he was prevented from leaving his cell and exercising in a courtyard like other prisoners. Around the same time, some of Amer’s books and other reading materials were arbitrarily confiscated. Lawyers at ANHRI told CPJ that they filed an appeal as soon as Amer was convicted, but that the authorities have failed to consider it two years into his four-year prison term. Legal experts in Egypt told CPJ that such appeals are usually processed within six months.

Read the full letter here.

.. Kareem was officially sentenced to 4 years in prison, 2 of which he has already served. Throughout this time Kareem has been beaten, humiliated and harassed. But he remains strong, despite feeling frustrated and lonely. He has written several letters which we have published here, expressing his current state and also his appreciation of everyone around the world who continues to fight for his cause.

A recent article in Menassat has also featured news from his letters:

BEIRUT, February 19, 2009 (MENASSAT)- “Do you think that life outside prison will be better or do you think it will be more hell than here?” imprisoned blogger Kareem Amer asked “Wahda Masrya” in a letter a few days ago.

Wahda Masrya, moderator of the blog “An Egyptian girl” and a close friend of Amer, told MENASSAT that the dissident blogger currently feels “very lonely” and that he is in need of “moral support.”

The blogger has been in prison since 2006, and it appears to have taken a hard toll on him.

“Prison has become a part of my imagination. I don’t remember what life was like before my imprisonment and what people look like outside,” Amer wrote in his letter.

Wahda Masrya said Amer’s atheist views make it especially hard for him and that he fears for his safety after his release from Alexandria’s Borg Al-Arab prison.

“In his letter, I see that he is frustrated. He wrote that he is not sure if being out will be safer for him. He needs to be reassured that he will be safe, as he is considered an atheist.” Wahdamasryra told MENASSAT.

Read the rest of the article here.

To find out how you can help, please visit this page, or obtain the prison address from this page and help give Kareem moral support by sending him a letter encouraging his strength.

Reporters Without Borders notes that:

A court in Al Zohor (west of Cairo) fined blogger Tamer Mabrouk (http://elhakika.blogspot.com) 2,500 Egyptian pounds (340 euros) on 20 January for allegedly libelling an Egyptian company, Trust Chemicals, in a blog entry accusing it of dumping hazardous waste in Lake Manzalah and the Suez Canal. The company filed its lawsuit last June.

[...]

Mabrouk’s lawyer, Rawda Ahmed, said it was the first time an Egyptian blogger had been sued by a private company over a blog entry.

Rawda is also Kareem’s lawyer. Kareem is still serving his 4 year prison sentence, which he received merely because of his blog posts.

Please continue fighting for Kareem’s cause. Contact us to see how you can help, or read this page.

WordPress is arguably the most celebrated blogging platform with millions of people using it around the world. We did not hesitate to use it as the platform of choice for both this blog and the plugin/widget described below.

The Plugin:
A plugin is a feature that extends the capabilities of WordPress. In this case, the Free Kareem plugin gives you the ability to promote Kareem’s cause through a simple widget, which you can conviniently place anywhere on your sidebar. Download it here [Instructions.]

What it looks like:

♦ The widget begins with a brief text summary of Kareem’s situation to get people’s attention on the seriousness of the issue.

♦ These social networking buttons will lead to Free Kareem’s Facebook and MySpace pages as well as the campaign’s YouTube and Twitter accounts. This is because not many people knew we existed on these platforms and may choose to stay in touch with us there as opposed to only this site.

♦ The “Tell a Friend” button leads you to a page where you can spread the cause via email to others.

♦ In the very near future, you will be able to do the following:

Customize the plugin from your admin interface.

Have the ability to remove social networking buttons and/or summary, replacing it with a picture of Kareem and/or a FreeKareem.org’s RSS feed. You will have several options to explore and the plugin can reflect only what you want.

Why:
Kareem has already spent 2 years of his life in prison. Now the media treats this as “old news” for the most part. We need to make sure that Kareem’s case remains prominent. Bloggers around the world can help us achieve that by downloading this plugin.

The Author:
Michael Torbert is ranked as the #1 WordPress Plugin Developer for 2008 (based on the total number of downloads of several of his plugins), making him an easy choice for us when we wanted to include the professional involvement of a WordPress developer. Michael supported our cause immediately and we sincerely thank him for his hard work with us.

The Future:
This plugin will continue being developed further depending on the feedback we receive. We are already working on some great additional features such as pictures, ability to exclude certain aspects of the widget, ability to include an RSS feed from FreeKareem.org, and generally making it as customizable as possible. But while we do that we need some help getting the word out on this plugin!

Open Source:
Like most WordPress plugins, the files are completely open source and anyone can build upon and improve this work, and if you do, please e-mail us and let us know so we can feature your work as well.

DOWNLOAD!
You can download this plugin from WordPress.org. It supports many versions of WordPress and works with any theme!

In a recent article featured in the Daily News Egypt, Kareem’s case is highlighted as a prominent example of Egypt’s increasing intolerance for freedom of speech:

February 2008 marked the first anniversary of the imprisonment of Kareem Amer, the first Egyptian blogger to be sentenced for his online writing. Amer’s jailing foresaw the trend described by CPJ in its annual census of journalists in prison, issued this month.

For the first time in CPJ’s prison census, online journalists represented the largest category (45 percent) of imprisoned media workers. CPJ attributes this to the “rising influence of online reporting and commentary.”

Many other examples are listed in this extensive article detailing Egypt’s punishment for anyone who dares to practice their basic right to free speech.

Despite over 2 years of worldwide protest, Egypt has yet to justify Kareem’s imprisonment with actual logic.

In celebration of Human Rights Day, Al Jazeera is currently holding a discussion on human rights violations in the Arab world, with an emphasis on Egypt.

In the report that accompanied the discussion, Kareem was quoted as an example of a young person unjustly imprisoned for his opinions, and FreeKareem.org was featured.

We are in the process of tracking the video of this. Once we find it, we will share it here.

Xaq Fixx of Bureaucrash, “a non-profit organization that facilitates freedom-oriented activism,” recently conducted this podcast with me about Kareem, the Free Kareem Campaign, and free speech in the Arab world. Bureaucrash members provided a lot of support for the campaign and have helped us organize several rallies for Kareem in the past two years in Washington D.C and Romania. We are grateful for their support and thank them for this podcast opportunity!

You can listen to it here.

A few weeks ago while we were still organizing worldwide rallies, we wrote about students at Roger Williams University and the event that they were hosting in support for Kareem.

The Phoenix now has a detailed account of how the rally went:

Last week, as many Americans were celebrating the victory of Barack Obama, Heather Klink and a group of her classmates at Roger Williams University staged a vigil to protest the continued imprisonment of the Egyptian blogger known as Kareem Amer.

Klink, a senior, says she learned about Amer’s case after taking PEN, a class taught by novelist Adam Braver in which students discuss the plight of imprisoned writers. As a result, some of her classmates and she launched a group, Pens of Peace, to agitate on the same issue.

[...]

Klink says she was part of a group of about 14 students and 10 faculty members who staged a vigil at RWU last Thursday on Amer’s behalf.

“It is the kind of case that everyone should be interested in,” she tells me, “especially students,” since Amer was 22 when he was arrested. As a creative writing major, Klink says, the prospect of being imprisoned for writing something “really hits close to home for me, as it should for all students here.”

Klink says Pens for Peace has focused on trying to raise awareness about Amer’s case, to get more people involved, and that it plans next semester to try to involve some of Rhode Island’s elected officials. Egypt is a major recipient of US foreign aid, so human-rights activists hope that increased pressure could have an impact.

“My concern is that by imprisoning Kareem Amer, they’re setting an example,” Klink says, and if this goes unchallenged, it will have negative consequences for free speech in Egypt and possibly elsewhere.

Link to original article.

We thank all the students and faculty at Roger Williams University for getting involved and spreading awareness about what Kareem is going through.