A Cairo court of cassation has reject a request by the lawyers of jailed blogger Abdel Kareem Nabil Suleiman, better known by the pen-name of Kareem Amer, for his case to be retried. The judges said they would give the reasons for their ruling on December 26, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported.
“This decision shows the Egyptian judicial system’s lack of independence,” Paris-based RSF said. “The authorities decided to make an example of Kareem Amer in order to intimidate Egyptians who use the Internet to express their views freely and criticise the government. We hope the court will at least give a detailed explanation to justify this arbitrary decision.”
Although all of Kareem Amer’s possibilities of appeal have been exhausted, the Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) has petitioned a Cairo administrative court for his release under an Egyptian law that allows the authorities to free prisoners for a “good conduct” when they have completed three quarters of their sentence, as Kareem Amer has. But it seems that interior minister Habib Ibrahim Habib Al-Adli is opposed to this possibility.
Arrested in November 2006 and mistreated in prison, Kareem Amer was given a four-year jail sentence on February 22, 2007 on charges of “insulting” the president and Islam. The sentence was confirmed on appeal on March 12, 2007.
He was arrested over the comments he had posted online criticising discrimination against women in Egypt and authoritarian excess of the government and the highest religious authorities including the Sunni University of Al-Azhar.
