29 Nov 11 | Asia and Pacific, Index Index, minipost
A Vietnamese court have halved the jail sentence of a blogger after international pressure from government’s and NGO’s. Pham Minh Hoang was sentenced to three years imprisonment for attempted subversion in August this year after he wrote 33 articles under a pseudonym, which were ruled by the court to “blacken the image of the country” and aimed to topple the government. Hoang will be released on January 13 after serving a 17-month sentence, but will then serve three years of house arrest.
18 Oct 11 | Egypt, Middle East and North Africa
Sahar Maher, human rights activist and a member of the Free Maikel campaign, has told Index that authorities are transferring Maikel Nabil to a “mental hospital”, where he would be “put under watch for 45 days to make sure his mental situation is OK”. Nabil, who was handed a three-year prison sentence for criticising the practice of trying civilians in military courts, was scheduled to have a re-trial today, but is refusing to stand trial. Family members fear that Nabil, who has been on hunger strike for 57 days, will die while imprisoned. On 17 October, Nabil made a statement from El-Marg prison on his reasons for refusing to attend his trial:
I also felt great insult from the insistence of my lawyers to ignore my willingness in boycotting the military judiciary, and their insistence to impose a guardianship on me and to litigate before the military judiciary without my knowledge and against my will. That’s why I announce that I won’t attend tomorrow’s session, and that no lawyer represents me before the military judiciary. May the militarists go to hell with their ugly theatrical play, I don’t beg for my freedom from a group of killers and homeland stealers.
Maher said that she supports Nabil’s decision, and added that “the judges don’t care about how people feel or what people do.” Maher, who is pessimistic about Nabil’s future, saw him yesterday and described him as looking “very ill and very weak”. Since Nabil’s lawyers did not attend court, Maher said that the court “commissioned another lawyer from the military court itself”, and that the lawyer asked that Nabil be moved to a mental hospital, and the court accepted the suggestion. Now that Nabil may be transferred to the hospital, Maher is worried that he will be kept in the hospital, and that he will be in captivity indefinitely.
Maher, who was arrested earlier this month while demonstrating for Nabil’s release, mentioned that she has faced a series of threats for speaking out against military trials and the treatment of Nabil, much like his father and brother. In his statement, Nabil condemned the threats against Maher and his family members:
I was saddened for the militarists’ chasing of the leaderships of the movement and especially my sister and my colleague Sahar Maher and threatening them with death, imprisonment and attempting to recruit them to the Intelligence as the militarists attempted with me and fail continually.
Maher said that “being threatened” is the least of her worries, and that she is more concerned with “what the country is going through.”
17 Nov 10 | Egypt, Middle East and North Africa
Online free expression activists around the world are rejoicing at the news that jailed Egyptian blogger Kareem Amer has been freed and had returned to his family’s Alexandria home. Amer won the Hugo Young Award for Journalism at the Index on Censorship Freedom of Expression awards in 2007.
Amer’s four-year jail sentence actually ended on 5 November, but the Egyptian authorities held on to him for nearly two weeks extra — prompting protests from Amnesty International and others. The Egyptian government — which grants itself sweeping powers under the so-called “emergency laws”— has a history of acting in defiance of its own judiciary. This includes openly ignoring court-ordered releases, or releasing a suspect and then immediately re-arresting him.
So the delay in Amer’s release had supporters worried that the police would simply keep him indefinitely.
Amer was sentenced to four years in prison in 2007, having already served two years in custody, for a package of charges that include insulting Islam, encouraging sedition and defaming President Hosni Mubarak.
His crimes: a series of blog posts that bluntly expressed his atheist beliefs and his criticism of the state of Islamic discourse. His case has already prompted a long-running solidarity campaign by supporters who consider him a “political prisoner”“, guilty of nothing more than thought crime.
Amer has made no public statements since his release. According his supporters, he has requested a bit of quiet and privacy with his family. It remains to be seen whether he will renew his writings, or whether the Egyptian police — particularly the notorious Alexandria contingent — will leave him alone.
15 Nov 10 | Uncategorized
Waleed Al-Husseini has been making waves and offending religious sensibilities in the Middle East for years. A committed atheist, the 26 year-old resident of the occupied West Bank is known for a prolific online presence — much of which centres on criticisms of all major religions.
Here’s a good example of his writing from his blog The Light of Reason. The headline loosely translates as “The personification of God and the lack of logic in his creation of the universe.” Al-Husseini even created a Facebook page claiming to speak in the name of God, and used his excellent command of Arabic to write altered versions of verses from the Koran.
So perhaps it was no surprise that Al-Husseini’s work infuriated both Muslims and Christians, and only a matter time before he ran afoul of the authorities. He disappeared at the end of October, and finally last week came the official confirmation that Al-Husseini had been arrested. Palestine’s semi-official Maan News Agency reported that security services had “pursued the man for more than two months” before catching up with him in an internet cafe in the West Bank of Qualqiya.
Numerous online defences of Al-Husseini have sprung up, in Arabic and English, demanding his release, and lobbying foreign governments to offer him asylum. Prominent regional blogger Marwa Rakha, who has met Al-Husseini, issued a passionate defence of his right to express himself regardless of whether anyone agrees or disagrees with his beliefs, writing
Waleed did not record his ideas on tapes and force you to listen to them in public transportation… Waleed did not stop you in the street for wearing a veil or for having a beard and force-feed you his arguments. Why are you afraid of him? Is your faith that fragile? Are your religious beliefs that vulnerable?
