This most recent incident confirms the fears of numerous women’s groups and rights organizations about the continued risk to the lives and health of girls, the inadequacy of the protection provided by the law, and the short-sightedness of a statutory philosophy based on stricter penalties while disregarding the social tolerance of female circumcision.
Programs: Civil Liberties
We write to you in your capacity as members of the Consultative Group of the Human Rights Council in relation to the appointment of Special Procedure mandate holders at the 38th, 39th and 40th sessions.
The 28th anniversary of World Press Freedom Day, May 3 each year, marks the first anniversary of the Egyptian authorities’ massive campaign to block press and media websites, which reached 98 blocked sites, according to the latest survey by the Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression (AFTE).
The EIPR found that from September 28, 2016, when the church construction law was issued, to April 2018, state institutions have shuttered 14 existing churches that were hosting religious services prior to the closure orders. Four of these churches were closed this year, with Copts denied access to them and prayer services in them prohibited.
It has been one year since Coptic citizens were displaced from Arish amid violent attacks that targeted many inside their homes. In this report the EIPR documents the living conditions of displaced Copts, looking at any assistance offered by state institutions and whether any genuine measures have been taken to realize justice and provide restitution to these citizens.
A year after the displacement, the security situation remains unstable and Christians are not afforded a minimum level of protection. The displaced families are therefore unable to return to Arish, and in some cases people who decided to return were targeted and killed by masked men.
The undersigned organizations strongly condemn Cairo University intransigence in renewing the 2018-2019 sabbatical of the assistant professor at Faculty of Arts at Cairo University, Kholoud Saber and ceasing the payment of her due salary since October 2017. The signatories demand from Cairo University the halt of such unlawful procedures, especially since they are induced by state security interventions in academic institutions and work.
The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights is deeply concerned about the judgment issued yesterday by the Atfih Misdemeanor Court in the Giza governorate in case no.
Introduction
On September 28, 2016, Law 80/2016 was adopted to regulate the construction and renovation of churches and their annexes. State officials, parliamentarians, and some sectors of the Christian ecclesiastical leadership heralded the new law as a solution to the long-standing difficulties of building or renovating churches.
The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights released a report today titled “The Trap: Punishing Sexual Difference in Egypt.” The report documents and analyses the increasingly frequent incidents, over the last four years, in which police have specifically targeted persons whose sexual orientation or gender identity does not conform to socially-sanctioned norms, specifically gay people or men who have sex with men, or those who are perceived as such, as well as transgender people.