Ten arrested while commemorating death of April 6 member

Ten members of the April 6 Youth Movement were arrested in Bulaq Dakrour Monday night, before being taken into custody in Bulaq Tuesday morning pending investigation, Zizo Abdo, a leading member of the April 6 Youth Movement, told Mada Masr.

According to him, approximately 50 people were assembling in Bulaq to go visit the house of April 6 member Ahmed al-Masry to commemorate the first anniversary of his death. Masry died last year while taking photographs of the violent dispersal of the Nahda sit-in that took place in August 2013.  They were met with plainclothes police officers, who arrested ten of them and subsequently took them to a Central Security Forces camp.

According to Abdo, the detainees face charges of road blocking, illegal assembly, protesting without a permit and using fireworks. Abdo pointed out that these are typical charges that have been used in similar cases, even before the revolution. “There is an obviously arbitrary crackdown on the youth in general, which has become clear in the last year,” he said.

The movement has been facing an intensive crackdown throughout the last year, along with other opposition movements, including human rights organizations and NGOs.

The April 6 Youth Movement, which has vocally opposed many of the current regime’s decisions, has been outlawed since December, after the Court of Urgent Affairs ruled that it has been receiving foreign funding to raise discord in Egypt and has been tarnishing Egypt’s image abroad. Leading members Ahmed Maher and Mohamed Adel, along with other activists, were arrested in November for violating the Protest Law.

“April 6 had been an opposition voice throughout last year and are still present in the street. They think that these blows will break the movement and stop the youth, but it actually makes them more determined to keep going,” Abdo said.