Remaining Sudanese protestors freed

The last group of Sudanese detainees, held by the Egyptian authorities since the violent break-up of a sit-in demonstration in December, has been released. The 156 remaining detainees were discharged from two prisons on 11 February, said Ahmed Mohsen, an assistant protection officer at the Cairo office of the UN refugee agency UNHCR. The move followed a plea for their release on humanitarian grounds by UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres, Mohsen added. The last group of detainees consisted of Sudanese who had not registered with UNHCR and were involved in a sit-in protest at a central square in Cairo near the UNHCR offices between September and December 2005. The mix of refugees, asylum seekers and other members of the Sudanese community demanded resettlement in a third country and better rights and living conditions. On 29 December, Egyptian police staged a massive security operation to evacuate the site, killing an estimated 27 people in the process. Between 2,000 and 2,500 protestors were immediately detained, to be subsequently released in smaller groups over the last six weeks. Human rights groups, meanwhile, have repeatedly called for an investigation into the police violence. “Given Egypt’s terrible record of police brutality, an independent investigation is absolutely necessary to assess responsibility and punish those responsible,” said Joe Stork, deputy director of the Middle East & North Africa division at Human Rights Watch. Government investigations into the violence were currently “on hold”, Nasser Hamzawy, an official at the African affairs department of the foreign affairs ministry, confirmed. “The ship disaster is being given priority at the moment,” he added, referring to the sinking of a ferry in the Red Sea on 3 February in which over 950 people perished. “The investigation will, like all other investigations in Egypt, continue to be shrouded in darkness,” commented Wagdi Abdel-Aziz, director of the Centre for Southern Studies, a local NGO. Abdel-Aziz went on to point out that the main problem facing freshly released Sudanese detainees was their lack of legal documentation or right to stay in Egypt. In spite of government guarantees that none of the protestors would be deported to Sudan, he added, “as illegal migrants, they’re exposed to the danger of being deported at any time”. Members of Cairo’s large community of Sudanese refugees and asylum seekers, meanwhile, expressed dissatisfaction with the protest’s outcome. “It’s all very well that the Sudanese have been freed from prison,” said protest organiser Amir Khaled, leader of the Voice of Sudanese Refugees, a local community group. “But this doesn’t signify any change to our status, nor does it resolve any of our problems,” he pointed out, adding that initial demands made by the protesters had not been met.