The criminal court renewed the detention of “The alliance of hope” political detainees for 45 days, despite they exceeded the maximum period of pretrial detention, determined by the law at 2 years.
The case includes preacher Khaled Abu Shady, lawyer Ziad el-Elaimy, journalist Hesham Fou’ad, journalist Hossam Mo’nes, labor leader Hassan al-Barbary, activist Rami Shaath, businessman Omar al-Shenity, and accountant Alaa Essam and others.
The lawyers demanded release of detainees who spent more than 2 years in parole without being sentenced, but the court decided to renew their detention in violation of the law. In June 2019, the Egyptian authorities arrested dozens of politicians and activists from various political attitudes accusing them of planning to make a mess before the parliamentary elections. Some of detainees explained that they met to arrange an alliance to run for the next parliament; what the authorities in Egypt considered a political threat and decided to abort it through fabricating a fake story about an organization that plan to make a public mess.
Although the Egyptian authorities failed since the arrest of the politicians and activists to prove any plans of illegal movements, the politicized judiciary kept the detainees in parole. Furthermore, the Egyptian authorities, early in 2021, inserted Ziad al-Elaimy and Rami Shaath on terrorism lists in a step that was condemned by UN human rights experts.
