CAIRO, 19 May 2006 — Egyptian security forces clubbed demonstrators in the streets yesterday and a court rejected an appeal against a jail term by a former election challenger to President Hosni Mubarak in twin blows to the opposition.
Plainclothes security men beat and kicked protesters rallying in support of Egyptian judges and judicial independence in Cairo, while Egypt’s highest appeal court threw out the appeal by jailed opposition leader Ayman Nour.
Nour had appealed against a five-year prison sentence handed down to him in December. He cannot launch another appeal. Nour says the charges against him of forging signatures to found the liberal Ghad Party were fabricated by the authorities.
The opposition Muslim Brotherhood, the largest of several groups, which came out in solidarity with the judges, said police arrested more than 500 of its members who had tried to protest yesterday near the High Court while the panel was in session.
Some 180 Brotherhood members were injured in the crackdown — the latest tough police response to a series of protests over the judges. The detainees included Essam El-Erian, the head of the Brotherhood’s policy department.
In the face of a massive police presence in the city center, the demonstrators, who also included secular activists, gathered in pockets and dispersed when authorities moved in to arrest them.
In a crowded market area just north of the High Court, photographer Tara Todras-Whitehill said plainclothes men backed by riot police chased a group of about 800 people down the street and picked off stragglers for attack.
Another group of plainclothes security men clubbed and hit Brotherhood supporters accompanying a group of Brotherhood MPs as they tried to reach the court, a Reuter’s correspondent said.
The judicial disciplinary panel yesterday punished one of the judges, Hesham Bastawisi, by withholding his next promotion. But the panel cleared the second, Mahmoud Mekky.
Neither attended the session. Bastawisi did not attend the hearing because he was still in hospital, having suffered a heart attack on Wednesday.
The panel ruled that he would be dismissed from the judiciary if he committed another offense. The two judges have come to symbolize a campaign by the Judges Club for independence from interference by the executive.
Thousands of police, armed with sticks and shields, sealed off streets around the High Court and the nearby Judges Club — flashpoints during weeks of protests.
