Mada Masr news website reported that officers from the National Security Agency began from August to hold meetings with political detainees in some prisons including Minya, Tora and Wadi Al-Natron, to convince them to quit any political activities and to appear in a presidential conference with Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi to say that their detention conditions were excellent. According to NSA officers, detainees could have a presidential pardon in October if they accept.

According to lawyers of political detainees, Tora Prison’s administration arranged for a presidential conference to be held in the prison with Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi and the minister of interior, during which selected prisoners including political detainees will appear to say prepared answers to the questions proposed in the conference.

The meetings in Minya and Wadi Al-Natron involved Islamists sentenced to intensive imprisonment on charges of protesting, and the detainees who accepted the offer were transferred to Tora. Lawyers predicted that several of the political detainees will be involved in the presidential pardon which is to be issued in October on the anniversary of the 6th of October war or the Prophet’s birthday, in the same month.

Another official source explained that the improvement of human rights in Egypt is dependent on the potential meeting between Al-Sisi and the US President Joe Biden during the UN General Assembly.