Egypt: RSF demands authorities shed light on missing cartoonist
Ashraf Omar, a cartoonist for the Egyptian online news site Al-Manassa, was abducted from his home on the night of July 21, blindfolded, and taken to an unknown location, according to Reporters Without Borders (RSF)’s information. RSF calls on the Egyptian authorities to fully clarify Omar’s whereabouts.
Updated on 6/8/2024: Ashraf Omar reappeared at the public prosecutor's office in Cairo on July 24. He was placed in pre-trial detention, accused of "spreading false news" for cartoons about the economic crisis. As his pre-trial detention was renewed for an additional 15 days on August 5, his lawyer revealed that he had been tortured by electrocution. This torture must stop and Ashraf Omar must be released immediately.
On Sunday night at 1:30 a.m., two minibuses stopped in front of the Cairo home of cartoonist and translator Ashraf Omar, according to surveillance camera footage reviewed by his wife Nadia Mougheeth the following morning. Mougheeth had spent the night away from home and noticed his absence the next morning at 9 a.m. when he didn't answer the phone. An hour later, after alerting the neighbors, Mougheeth asked the building’s security guards to break down the door. Mougheeth told RSF that the guards found the house in disarray, as if it had been searched. The television was on, and the cartoonist's belongings—his phone, wallet, equipment, and money—were also missing.
Ashraf Omar appears in the surveillance footage at 2:10 a.m., accompanied by several men, most in plain clothes. Blindfolded and handcuffed, he is led to the minibus and taken away. "I still don’t know why they took him," Nadia Mougheeth told RSF. "But until he calls me and says he is detained at police station X or Y, I consider him kidnapped."
Al-Manassa published an article stating that it has called on Prosecutor General Mohamed Shawky to "clarify the journalist's situation, announce his place of detention, the charges against him, and allow his lawyer to meet him." In a statement, the Freedom Committee of the Egyptian Press Syndicate condemned "the arrest of the cartoonist," and demanded "the disclosure of his place of detention and the circumstances of his arrest, as well as his immediate release."
"Unfortunately, it is not uncommon in Egypt for journalists to disappear before reappearing in a courtroom a few days later as prisoners. This type of method is not befitting a state of law. We urge the Egyptian authorities to break their silence, to do everything possible to find the cartoonist, and to ensure that he is reunited with his family. These practices that terrorize journalists must stop.
At least five of the 15 other media professionals currently imprisoned in Egypt also disappeared for several days before reappearing behind bars. This includes Tawfik Ghanem, former editor-in-chief of the online news site IslamOnline and the Anadolu news agency. Now 70 years old, the journalist disappeared on May 21, 2021, and reappeared in court on May 26 of the same year. He has been in prison, despite the absence of a trial, ever since.
Egypt is ranked 170th out of 180 countries in RSF's 2024 World Press Freedom Index and remains one of the most predatory countries for journalists and media professionals.
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