Tag: Egypt

Whose Lives Matter?: A Conversation on Police Brutality Across Borders

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By Carla Diot
Staff Writer

In recent response to the social unrest over the mysterious circumstances of 25-year old Freddie Gray’s death while in police custody, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei published several tweets expressing solidarity to protesters, all while attacking the United States for its inadequate responses to the deaths of Mike Brown, Eric Garner, and Trayvon Martin. Using the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter, Khamenei tweeted “It’s ridiculous that even though US President is black, still such crimes against US blacks continue to occur.” The additional tweets, which can be found on Khamenei’s Twitter page, are not the first time that Iran has used such incidents as a platform to attack the United States. During the height of protests in Ferguson, Missouri, Ayatollah Khamenei attacked the United States, calling it the “biggest violator of #HumanRights,” committing not only international crimes, but crimes against its own citizens.

The perspective of the conversation on police brutality in the United States has been focused domestically. President Obama recently declared the allocation of $20million to local police departments across the United States to be used specifically for purchasing body cameras to monitor police behavior towards citizens. However, the nationwide issue has also had international repercussions. The United States has received criticism from the international community, including countries such as Egypt, Russia, and Iran, as well as in forums such as the United Nations. This has provoked an international conversation on police brutality, with the United States serving as the principle violator. Yet, many of the countries who saw the unrest in Ferguson and Baltimore as an opportunity to attack the United States have also been responsible for police brutality against their own citizens, and have, ironically, been criticized by the United States for doing so.

After the death of 18-year old Mike Brown, the town of Ferguson, Missouri erupted into a series of protests, and were met with escalated responses by St. Louis county police and the National Guard. In Ferguson, images of the high tensions between the protestors, the police, and the media were broadcast around the world. The images provided an opportunity for international political leaders and media to highlight the United States’ unsolved racial tensions. In Russia, government-controlled channels such as Russia Today and Rossiya 24 reported on the unrest, calling the scene a war zone. The conversation in Russia also focused on comparisons of the unrest in Missouri to the current unrest in Ukraine, even referring to the protests in Ferguson “Afromaidan.” The term gained significant ground and has also been used in describing the current ongoing protests in Baltimore. Russian politicians also got involved in attacking the United States, with the Russian Foreign Ministry’s representative for human rights, democracy, and the rule of law, Konstantin Dolgov commenting that, “While urging other countries to guarantee freedom of speech and not to suppress anti-government protests, the U.S. authorities at home are none too soft on those actively expressing discontent over persistent inequalities, actual discrimination and the situation of ‘second class’ citizens.” While preaching these values, the Russian government eclipses their own treatment of second-class citizens.

In fact, Russia is not exempt from condoning brutality against its own citizens. In 2014, Human Rights Watch published License to Harm: Violence and Harassment against LGBT People and Activists in Russia. The report was scathing, accusing Russia of treating LGBT citizens as second-class citizens after the passage of a law banning “the promotion of non-traditional sexual relationships.” While the language behind the law was noted for its vagueness, its intention was clearly seen as attacking LGBT citizens. Since the passage of the law, Human Rights Watch noted a rise in brutality against LGBT citizens. Most of the subjects interviewed for Human Rights Watch claimed that while the attacks were from vigilante groups such as Occupy Pedophilia, police officers often sided with the attackers, with one officer even claiming he would have done the same thing to the victim. Police officers both sided with, and participated in violence against LGBT citizens and activists. For such reasons, brutality against LGBT citizens went unreported, leaving them without any rights to justice.

In Egypt, the foreign ministry called on the United States to show restraint towards demonstrators in Ferguson over the summer. The Foreign Ministry claimed that it was “closely following the escalation of protests” and urged the U.S. government to find answers to Mike Brown’s death. The Egyptian government’s call had come at a time when tensions between the two countries were strained after the Egyptian government arrested and convicted forty-three non-governmental (NGO) workers under charges of operating without a license. The case was controversial, as critics argued that the law was vague and used to control NGOs. Several months after the conviction of the workers, President Obama announced the suspension of military aid to the Egyptian government, only releasing it under conditions that Egypt show credible steps towards free and fair elections. The withholding of military aid was used to show displeasure with Egypt’s violation of human rights at the time. Thus, when instability struck Ferguson, it was an opportunity for Egypt to demonstrate the hypocrisy of the United States in its policing of human rights.

Yet in calling for restraint, Egypt conveniently clouds its recent history of violence against dissidents. One of the most notable cases of violence against protesters was the Raba’a massacre, whose two year anniversary will be commemorated in August 2015. The massacre occurred after supporters of the ousted Mohammad Morsi gathered around the Raba’a al-Adawiya mosque to protest the coup against Morsi. The group consisted mostly of Muslim Brotherhood supporters, a group that would continue to be targeted by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s administration after the massacre. The demonstrations began peacefully, with supporters establishing camps around the mosque, but when it came time to disperse the camps, supporters were met with violence from the police. Though the death toll of the massacre is still unknown, it is estimated to range from 600 to 1,000 deaths. The crackdown was met with heavy criticism from the international community, with many groups such as the United Nations calling it a violation of human rights law. The United States immediately addressed the massacre, with President Obama responding through sharp words and the cancellation of a joint U.S.-Egyptian military exercise, known as Bright Star. In his address, Obama noted that “the Egyptian people deserve better than what we’ve seen over the last several days.” The incident was seen as another step in the deterioration of U.S.-Egypt relations. However, even more notably, the incident failed to create real dialogues in addressing violence against citizens.

The time for the United States to address police brutality may have finally arrived. After the deaths of Mike Brown, Tamir Rice, Darrien Hunt, and Freddie Gray, the United States has begun to move towards repairing race relations, and ensuring equity in human rights. Countries such as Russia, Iran, and Egypt are justified in criticizing the human rights abuses of the United States, and their words should be taken seriously. Yet it is their intentions that are lacking and should be criticized. For these countries, including the United States, human rights goes from being a goal for countries to aspire towards, to a back-and-forth game in an international political arena. Countries should reconsider their use of human rights discourse as a propaganda tool, as it results in empty words and fear-mongering. Instead, criticisms of another country’s human rights violation should be used to conduct thoughtful self-reflection and as an initiative to address the abuses seen in a productive way domestically.

Photo by Light Brigading

SISI’S EGYPT: REPRESSION AT A CROSSROADS

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By Matt M. Joye
Senior Editor

In Egypt, it remains a very good thing to be a general. Even the protestors who occupied Tahrir Square and brought down the former general-turned-dictator Hosni Mubarak courted the support of the army. Now, after just over a year of rule by President Mohamed Morsi, the coup that unseated him has placed another former general in the presidential palace. Indeed, since the toppling of the monarchy in 1952, Morsi remains the only civilian elected to Egypt’s highest office. Yet despite the clamoring of average Egyptians for a return to stability, the landslide electoral victory of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has not been a harbinger of democratic transition. It may in fact signal a dark road ahead for the country that cast off a 30-year despot less than four years ago.

Much has transpired since the momentous swell of popular protest and revolution—known collectively as the Arab Spring—began in Tunisia on Dec. 18, 2010, and exploded onto the world stage. Indeed, even now its imprint extends from the current Occupy Central movement in Hong Kong, to the unseating of President Blaise Compaore in Burkina Faso after 27 years of rule, and more ominously in the continuing civil wars in Ukraine and Syria. Nowhere became more synonymous with this global movement than Egypt: hundreds of thousands gathered in the streets of Cairo, centered on the iconic Tahrir Square, to demand the ouster of President Mubarak. In the end, after withstanding a brutal and deadly crackdown, they remained; gone was the former general who had ruled the country for almost 30 years.

The celebration of that victory would certainly have been tempered if protestors had known three years later another former general would occupy the presidential palace. Elected with 96.1% of the vote, President Sisi seemed to gain some form of democratic legitimacy after leading the coup that deposed President Morsi in July 2013. In one sense it ended an aberration: the military has been the dominant institution in Egypt since at least the overthrow of the monarchy in 1952. After being sidelined for a year by the electoral victory of Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood—the only other viable organized political institution in Egypt—it would appear the generals have escaped banishment to the barracks and returned to the field, albeit with somewhat bruised egos. [1]

Indeed Sisi’s ascension has taken on aspects of a jilted institution determined to re-establish the power and prestige of a group that has long dominated the Egyptian state. At times this has bordered on the bizarre. Sisi and the regime have advanced a cult of personality built around the president as Egypt’s savior. The Egyptian media coverage of his recent United Nations speech portrayed a triumphant and overwhelming response by the assembly to his address; the New York Times version was less glowing, noting the applause came almost exclusively from his entourage. Egypt’s private media outlets have vowed to observe a self-imposed gag order on criticism of his government. One satellite network even stated, “…freedom of expression cannot ever justify ridicule of the Egyptian Army’s morale.” After the United States briefly suspended some military aid to Egypt, US Secretary of State John Kerry was subjected to security wands on visiting the presidential palace—unusual for a visiting dignitary. In the midst of protests in the aftermath of the death of Michael Brown at the hands of a Ferguson, Missouri police officer, Egypt’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs even issued a statement advising the US to undertake “respect for the right of assembly and peaceful expression of opinion.”

Obviously at times it pays to have a short memory. The violent attack on Pro-Morsi demonstrations by the military in the aftermath of his overthrow killed over eight hundred people, according to Human Rights Watch, and was unlikely to have occurred without at least tacit approval from Sisi: he was in charge of the military and deputy prime minister at the time. The Muslim Brotherhood is now banned as a “terrorist” organization, which has swept up many non-Brotherhood supporters in the subsequent raids. Perhaps most ironic, the leader who has only risen to power because of a series of protests now bans demonstrations of more than ten people without a special permit, and these are hard to procure.

Foreign and domestic non-governmental organizations, under the guise that they provide a conduit for foreign interference, have also faced new restrictions. NGOs that are based in Egypt will now need the approval of the government before accepting any foreign funding. When HRC tried to deliver its findings on the Rabaa Square massacre, its representatives were turned away at the airport and prevented from even entering the country: this was the first time HRC had been denied entrance to Egypt. Former US President Jimmy Carter’s NGO, which promotes free elections and human rights, has already withdrawn, with Carter citing an environment so antithetical to democracy that it “could be extremely difficult, and possibly dangerous, for critics of the regime” to remain.

Two Egyptian institutions that were critical to the development of resistance and opposition to Mubarak were universities and mosques. Both have been targeted by repressive government measures. Muslim imams and preachers must now have approval from the government, and many smaller houses of worship have been closed. At Friday prayers, every preacher must deliver the same sermon. Universities, once a space free from police and thus safe to demonstrate after the restrictions, have been rocked by arrests and violence now that security forces have returned. Now long lines and searches are mandatory just to enter campus, staff may be fired for “inciting” demonstrations, and the head of each university is appointed by the president under new restrictive policies. A wave of preemptive arrests and protests has resulted.

In the aftermath of an attack by militants in the Sinai Peninsula on Oct. 24 that left more than 30 soldiers dead, the Egyptian Army bulldozed hundreds of houses to create a buffer at the Gaza border—initially giving only 24 hours advance notice—and leaving thousands homeless. The Sinai has long been a battleground between militants and the Egyptian military. But the attack has upped the ante, as the military had claimed until now it was winning the war against the insurgents. The Egyptian government has responded with additional repressive measures. One such policy, which hands prosecution for violations of public utilities over to military courts, is broad enough that marches on public roads could fall within the new jurisdiction.

Under even the most enlightened leadership, Egypt faces numerous challenges that would test the functionality of the state. Economic pressures are almost at a breaking point, with the collapse of the tourism industry, the decline of export revenues as gas and oil production decline, and a bloated bureaucracy and huge debts that siphon off much of its budget. Recent cuts in fuel subsidies, which caused gas prices to spike by 80 percent while electricity costs also rose, are not popular and thus speak to the extent of the crisis. The violence in the Sinai is unlikely to diminish in the near future. The specter of a Muslim Brotherhood re-emergence from the shadows is equal parts convenient spook and real fear in the minds of military brass.

Yet in the overwhelming crackdown on any entity that remotely threatens the rule of the military, there are potential seeds of opposition sown. Public support of the military has fallen dramatically, and the underpinning of earlier support—the wish for a return of stability after the chaos of the revolution and the Morsi regime—largely hinges on whether Sisi can deliver both stability and the economic growth that might accompany it. The removal of fuel subsidies was in part directed at the IMF, which is currently withholding a $4.8 billion loan critical for debt payments. Some investment has returned, but Sisi has not shed the state-centric economic model of old. Egypt has a history of cronyism based on state protections for favored industries: the military has often been the biggest beneficiary of state-directed economic ventures (Mubarak was personally connected to at least 469 businesses). It is possible that the stability of a Sisi regime will restore the stability necessary for economic growth and investment, which might be the biggest panacea for the ills of Egyptians.

There is a more dire option. With so much pressure on every avenue of dissent and political organization, overwhelming repression might produce far more determined—and risk-adverse—adversaries. The designation of the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization is no doubt politically expedient, but the wider net of oppression might alienate much larger segments of the population. Cracking down on universities, mosques, demonstrations and the like leaves little room for opposition within orthodox political channels. The domestic situation also limits the support that Egypt can garner from its longstanding allies, namely the US. The attempts by Sisi to foster closer ties with Russia stem in part from the hesitancy the US showed—read temporary suspension of military aid—after the coup that brought him to power. Egypt needs to address its structural deficiencies and attract investment to deliver on the growth that is the justification for its authoritarian rule—trading freedoms for the sake of stability. If Sisi cannot deliver an economy that at least partially fulfills the promises of the revolution and coup, it may take all of the qualities of the general in him to hold onto power. For those who occupied Tahrir Square four years ago, this might seem all too familiar.

1. Bahgat, Gawdat and Robert Sharp. “Prospects for a New US Strategic Orientation in the Middle East.” Mediterranean Quarterly 25.3 (2014): 27-39. Project MUSE. Web. Oct. 29, 2014.

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