On Friday, local rights groups issued a joint statement announcing the formation of a coalition demanding the freedom of civil society, in conjunction with the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP27, scheduled to be held in Sharm el-Sheikh in November 2022.
The statement said that `the coalition aims to press for the defence of civil society and the release of politically arrested individuals. The statement stressed that the coalition aspires to benefit from COP27 to shed light on the suffering of political detainees, including human rights defenders and journalists.
The coalition seeks to build a narrative that demonstrates the connection between climate justice and civil society freedom, engaging local civil society actors in the global climate movement. It consists of the Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression, the Committee for Justice, the Egyptian Forum for Human Rights, the Egyptian Front for Human Rights, Sinai for Human Rights, the Freedom Initiative, and Egypt Wide. The Guardian had said in a recent report that Egyptian civil society organizations complained of being excluded from participating in COP27.
