Egypt: Authorities Must End The Arbitrary Detention Of Galal Behairy
Galal Behairy. Photo courtesy of Galal Behairy’s family
06 March: PEN International reiterates the call to end the arbitrary detention of Egyptian poet and lyricist Galal El-Behairy who has now spent five years in prison. PEN International is deeply concerned over El-Behairy’s health condition as he begins an open-ended hunger strike to protest his unfair imprisonment. We hold the Egyptian authorities responsible for his physical and psychological health and well-being.
PEN International has obtained a copy of a moving message from El-Behairy in which he declared that he would begin a hunger strike on 5 March and that he will gradually escalate his strike, including refraining from taking heart medication and antidepressants. In his message, he questioned the reason behind his ongoing ordeal and why he is losing his life behind bars despite having done nothing wrong. A translation of the messeage is available below.
In July 2021, El-Behairy completed a three-year prison term. However, rather than being released, he was instead subjected to enforced disappearance for three weeks before being charged with ‘disseminating false news’ and ‘joining a terrorist group’ by the Supreme State Security Prosecution (SSSP) in case no:2000/2021. The Egyptian authorities are notorious for bringing additional charges against prisoners of conscience in order to keep them in arbitrary pre-trial detention for prolonged periods. Along with other detainees, El-Behairy joined a collective hunger strike for several weeks in February 2022 to protest their arbitrary detention. However, demands to end his ordeal were ignored.
PEN continues to call on the Egyptian authorities to release Galal El-Behairy immediately and unconditionally.
Background
Galal El-Behairy, an Egyptian poet and lyricist, has been held since 5 March 2018 and has reportedly been tortured and beaten in detention. He initially faced charges of ‘joining a terrorist group’, ‘disseminating false news’, and ‘insulting the President’ for lyrics he had written for the song Balaha, which was performed and disseminated online by exiled Egyptian singer Ramy Essam. The case was eventually dropped, but he remained in detention.
In a separate case, on 31 July 2018, El-Behairy was sentenced to three years imprisonment and a fine of 10,000 Egyptian Pounds by a military court on charges of ‘disseminating false news and rumours by writing a book containing false news and statements about the Egyptian armed forces’, and ‘insulting the Egyptian army by issuing a book containing phrases that offend the Egyptian army’. The sentence related to his book of poetry, The Finest Women on Earth, which challenged the official narrative around the Egyptian military and its relation to politics. Later, the Court confirmed the three-year sentence at the appeal stage and dropped the fine.
PEN International has reliably learned that his health has significantly deteriorated during his imprisonment, as a result of the poor prison conditions in which he is held, and the lack of adequate medical care. El-Behairy reportedly suffers from heart problems, high blood pressure, and acute depression.
In April 2022, President Abdelfattah Al-Sisi called for political dialogue, addressing the human rights situation in the country and reactivating the ‘Presidential Amnesty Committee’. The Committee was initially formed in 2016 to consider cases of political prisoners and prisoners of conscience. However, nearly a year later, thousands of Egyptians remain arbitrarily imprisoned due to their legitimate practice of the right to freedom of expression. The authorities have imposed severe restrictions on freedom of expression, including on press freedom and social media: PEN International has documented numerous cases of writers, poets, journalists, and bloggers who have been arrested by the Egyptian authorities for peacefully expressing their opinions. Many of them face discriminatory treatment in jail, including the denial of reading and writing materials, restrictions or total denial to in-person family visits, refusal of opportunity to exercise outside their cells, and denial of many other legal rights guaranteed to prisoners under Egyptian law.
PEN calls on the Egyptian authorities to urgently and unconditioannly release the many writers who remain detained in violation of their right to freedom of expression.
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I write to you
from the heart of my ancient cell
Leaning my back against the wall
Just like my grandfather used to lean
Prison is like a labor contractor
I inherited that lean from my grandfather
Just like I inherited prison from him
My heir:
Who will inherit you one day
Whether soon, or in the distant future?
Why would the sun ever
leave the peasant’s neck?
Yesterday, the Khedive’s whip
never rested and nor did we
‘Corvée labor’ means imprisonment
And our history is replete with wounds
The rule of many over one
And he who rules over many is a slayer!
…
I see myself in the distance
There, up ahead
I watch myself in the past
There, among the common people
The same features…
Let the days whirl
Spin like time
Turning to turn
I might be a builder from the time of the pyramids
A wage slave, day laborer
with only his own shoulder to rely on
A metalsmith
A painter and welder
A soldier, fighter
on the march
I might be a sculptor
breathing the spirit of goddess Isis into marble
A lover tattooing
her lines on the palm
Or a peasant protesting
injustices directly to rulers
A peasant with the prestige
of a powerful alphabetical letter
Beaten down but tough
while fighting starvation
I might be a black girl
in a Melaya shawl
A loud protester chanting for homeland
in a Square
Or beautiful girls
parading for monsters
I found myself silenced
My insides crammed with words
A murdered man guarding
his revolution from kidnapping
How much are we worth, my country?
Are we the wound or
are we the blood seeping out?
…
My voice betrays me and breaks inside
In my silence is my death
Singing is a passion
My dear country, how
can I sing to you
If I saw my death
for one song
Galal El-Behairy
5 March 2023
Badr 1 Prison, Egypt
Translation of Galal El-Behairy’s message
Five years have passed .. five years if we tried to take them apart, they would equal 1800 days and more. This could be just a regular number among the numbers, but when it becomes leaves falling from your life-trees, it becomes demonic and frightening.
In the past, I used to know that if one’s wallet or car was stolen, they would go to the nearest police station and get help. But I do not know who would help that whose life is being stolen.
We were brought up to know the concept of “country” to be a vast, astonishing, and amazing entity, but why this entity was reduced to the space of a meter in a cell inside a prison? Why this amazing entity turned into a terrifying freak with a principal role to destroy its sons’ lives and obliterate everything that is beautiful and humane in them.
I think I am a son of this country, and I think there are much important roles that me and all those like me, whose hands never shed blood or minds ever knew the way to extremism, than to wither and grow old behind bars.
Today I start my sixth year of a life wasted in prisons. Behind me many shameful accusations, the least is lying and the worst is terrorism, all of which I did not commit, but one, “Poetry”.
Mature poetry, naive poetry, idealistic or adolescent poetry, it is “poetry”.
Today, I decided to practice my constitutional and human right to protest this inhumane situation by starting a hunger strike. First, I will refrain from taking food, my heart medication and antidepressants, and gradually I will refrain from drinking water.
The strike will continue until I regain my freedom, either alive or dead.
Galal El-Behairy
Badr 1 Prison
Cell 55/2
Section 4
Sunday 5 March 2023
For more information, please contact Mina Thabet, Head of the MENA Region, at PEN International, Koops Mill Mews, Unit A, 162-164 Abbey St, London, SE1 2AN, Tel.+ 44 (0) 20 7405 0338, email: [email protected]