The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) calls on Prosecutor General Mohamed Shawky to urgently intervene and enforce the law by releasing Mohamed Shaalan (25 years old), who has been in pretrial detention for over four and a half years in connection with Case No. 662/2020. On 24 September, the First Terrorism Circuit, held at the Badr Prison Complex and presided over by Judge Mohamed El-Said El-Sherbiny, decided to extend the detention of EIPR’s client for an additional 45 days. This decision constitutes a flagrant violation of Article 143 of the Criminal Procedure Code, which limits the maximum period of pretrial detention to two years.

Shaalan was arrested on January 20th, 2021, at Cairo Airport upon his return from Italy. He was subjected to enforced disappearance for over 15 days, as he was detained at the airport for 11 days, followed by 5 days of detention at the National Security Sector headquarters in Kafr El Sheikh. He then appeared on February 7th, 2021 before the Supreme State Security Prosecution (SSSP) in New Cairo, which charged him with joining a terrorist group and being involved in arms smuggling operations through Libya, according to the preliminary investigation report.

The charges assume that Shaalan was in Libya, which is not plausible, as he emigrated to Italy illegally when he was 15. All documents submitted by Shaalan’s defence confirm that he has been in Italy since a Red Cross operation rescued him off the Italian coast. He was subsequently enrolled in a school affiliated with public educational institutions for minors. He later obtained legal residency in 2015 and was issued a passport by the Egyptian consulate in Milan in 2016. He continued to work legally until 2021, when he decided to travel to Egypt to visit his family and later return to obtain Italian citizenship. However, he was arrested immediately upon his arrival at Cairo Airport.

During the only interrogation with Shaalan in more than four years, the prosecution did not present him with any objective evidence to support the charges against him. Furthermore, none of the relevant authorities made any effort to verify the truth of the accusations, nor were any of the documents submitted multiple times by Shaalan’s defence examined, documents which confirms the implausibility of the charges, and demonstrates that he lived and worked legally in Italy from 2015 until his return in January 2021.

It is worth noting that most of the defendants in Case No. 662/2020 are fishermen from the village of Burg Megheizal and neighbouring villages. Their total number reached 44, and one of them already died during his pretrial detention. Meanwhile, the SSSP has decided to release about seven of the defendants in the past few days.