Mary Lawlor, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders, condemned expanding the detention of the architect Ibrahim Ezz el-Deen, the researcher for the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedom, by inserting him on a new legal case after releasing him from pretrial detention where he was being held on a different one.

“#HRD Ibrahim Ezzedine’s release was ordered on 27 Dec but never complied with. He was instead brought before the Supreme State Security Prosecution in a new case, accused of belonging to a ‘terrorist’ group, and remains in pretrial detention,” Lawlor twitted on Tuesday. “He should be immediately released.”

Earlier, Lawlor had welcomed the court’s order to release Ezz el-Deen on December 27 from case no. 488 of year 2019, but this release was never carried out. “Ezz el-Deen remained in the custody of the police station after the release decision awaiting the approval of the National Security Apparatus,” said the ECRF in a statement on Facebook. Later on January 3, he appeared before the SSSP where he was put in case no. 1018 of year 2020.

Ibrahim Ezz el-Deen’s story begun in June 2019, when he was arrested against the background of his criticism and activity against the state’s urban policy. Ezz el-Deen questioned the feasibility of the New Administrative Capital, the project that has received great interest from Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. Moreover, Ezz el-Deen criticised the state policies towards the slums, especially in the al-Warrraq Island and Maspero Triangle areas.

Ezz el-Deen was subjected to enforced disappearance for 167 days, suffering physical and psychological assaults in one of the headquarters of the disreputable National Security, before being referred to the SSSP.