Two years have passed since the Emergency Supreme State Security Court issued a non-appealable prison sentences, against 31 members of the Egyptian Coordination for Rights and Freedoms (ECRF), including lawyers Hoda Abdel Moneim, Mohamed Abu Huraira, Ezzat Ghoneim, and Aisha Al-Shater, in Case No 1552 of 2018 (Supreme State Security). 

The sentence was issued on March 5th 2023 against the four human rights defenders. It ranged from five to fifteen years in prison, plus a supplementary sentence of monitoring after their release, in addition to placing them on the terror list. They were accused of joining and financing a terrorist group, possessing publications and recordings to promote a terrorist group, and using websites to spread false news.

While Ghoneim and Abu Huraira are serving 15-year jail terms, Ghoneim, who has been arrested since March 2018, wasn’t informed that he was being recycled into a new case, No 1552 of 2018, till he was interrogated weeks before the case was referred to court in 2021. Meanwhile, Abu Huraira was put on trial after spending more than two years in pretrial detention in violation of law. He was arrested along with his wife, Aisha al-Shater, before they got involved in the same case later.

Aisha Al-Shater served about six years of her ten-year jail term. Meanwhile, Hoda Abdel Moneim, 66, a former member of the National Council for Human Rights, was acquitted of the charge of financing a terrorist group, while she was sentenced to five years in prison for joining a terrorist group. Despite the expiration of her sentence, she has not been released, but rather recycled into other cases on the same charges. The same happened to the rest of the imprisoned ECRF members. Over the last seven years, the ECRF members have been illegally held in pretrial detention, during which they were detained in deteriorating conditions, where they were denied visits for varying periods, and deprived of their constitutional right to obtain the healthcare they need. The State Security Prosecution's actions indicate that their detention is endless, as they were repeatedly recycled into other cases on the same charges. 

These violations are similar to what was proven by the ECRF reports on the recycling of detainees, which the prosecution considered false news that requires trial and punishment.

In November 2021, a number of UN special rapporteurs addressed the Egyptian government regarding the violations and accusations against Abdel Moneim, Ghoneim and Al-Shater. They requested clarification of the measures Egypt is taking to ensure the protection and facilitation of the work of human rights defenders and civil society workers, including the three lawyers. However, the Egyptian government has not made any response.

Both Abdel Moneim and Al-Shater suffer from critical health conditions. So, Abdel Moneim, who has already served her full sentence and has no conviction at the moment, should be released. There is no reason for keeping a sick woman like her in detention. For her part, Al-Shater deserves a health pardon, especially after she served more than half of her sentence. In general, the situation of the four human rights defenders requires a review, as the sentences issued against them were not subject to appeal after they stood an exceptional trial in violation of Article 97 of the constitution.