Detention renewal session for hunger striking journalist tomorrow

Jailed Al Jazeera Arabic journalist Abdullah al-Shamy is due to be released or have his detention renewed tomorrow in front of the judge overseeing the “Marriot Cell” trial, according his brother and a solidarity event on Facebook.

The family is unsure whether Shamy will appear in court, his brother Mosaab, an award winning photojournalist, told Mada Masr.

The Facebook event calls on bloggers to dedicate today to highlighting the cases of Shamy and Mohamed Soltan, also jailed and on hunger strike, through social media sites. The event page is being hosted by Mahmoud Salmani, a member of the No to Military Trials Campaign.

Shamy was placed in solitary confinement last month in Cairo’s notorious maximum-security Al-Aqrab prison and has been denied medical care. Human rights organizations Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have called on Egyptian authorities to “immediately” and “unconditionally” release Shamy, who has been held without charge or trial.  

The news reporter was arrested last August, while covering the violent dispersal of a protest camp of Mohamed Morsi supporters in Cairo’s Rabea al-Adaweya square. Morsi was Egypt’s first elected civilian president who was deposed by the military last July.

Shamy began a hunger strike on January 21 and has lost more than a third of his body weight. During a previous court session in Cairo’s Tora prison complex, Shamy told reporters that after being moved to solitary confinement he was being force fed by prison authorities.

“By placing a hunger-striker in solitary confinement, instead of transferring him to a hospital or allowing him to see a doctor, the Egyptian authorities are deliberately putting his life and health at risk,” said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Amnesty’s Middle East and North Africa director.

The “Marriot Cell” refers to the trial of 20 Al Jazeera journalists, in which all but three are being tried in absentia.

Canadian-Egyptian bureau chief Mohamed Fahmy and Australian correspondent Peter Greste were arrested from two rented rooms at the Marriott Hotel in Cairo, which they had been using as a base of operations, on December 29. Egyptian producer Mohamed Baher was arrested on the same night from his house in suburban Cairo. All three work for Al Jazeera English.

They are being charged with broadcasting false news and aiding a terrorist organization, among other charges.

Soltan, a 26-year-old Egyptian American, was also detained last August after using his phone and Twitter account to document Egypt’s violent crackdown on the Rabea protest camp, in which he participated.

He recorded an emotional video message that was recently smuggled out of the Cairo prison in which he is being held, and published on the New York Times’ website. In it, he appeals to US President Barack Obama for help.

Soltan had to be wheeled into the courtroom last month after more than 100 days of hunger striking.

Two well-known activists announced their hunger strike last month in solidarity with Shamy and Soltan to protest their detention.

Activist and professor Laila Soueif and founder of the Nadeem Center for the Rehabilitation of Tortured Victims Aida Seif al-Dawla said in a statement that they are starting a hunger strike in solidarity with both detainees and Shamy’s wife Gehad Khaled, who has been on hunger strike for over 40 days herself.