US Congressmen call for Aya Hegazy’s release from prison

Two United States Congressmen have called for the immediate release of Aya Hegazy — a dual citizen of the US and Egypt — who has been in prison for over two years on what her family say are false charges, reported the Associated Press (AP) on Thursday.

Hegazy was arrested in in 2014 with her husband, Mohamed Hassanein, and several staffers from the Belady Foundation, an independent NGO which they founded aiming to support street children. She and the seven other defendants face charges ranging from running an unlicensed organization and inciting street children to join pro-Muslim Brotherhood protests, to sexually assaulting minors.

Hegazy and all of the other defendants have vehemently denied the accusations.

The two US congressmen decried the charges brought against Hegazy during a press conference with her family on Capitol Hill. Both congressmen represent Virginia, Hegazy’s home state where she grew up before moving to Egypt to found the Belady foundation.

Representative Don Beyer stated that no evidence has been produced to support the charges against her. He also condemned Hegazy’s long pretrial detention, which he said violated Egypt’s laws guaranteeing a speedy trial.

Hegazy has been held in pretrial detention since May 1, 2014 and her trial has been delayed seven times. Egypt’s criminal procedure law sets the limit for pretrial detention at two years, making Hegazy’s detention illegal.

Beyer also paid tribute to Hegazy saying, “Aya should be praised as a hero, someone who has championed the neglected.”

Representative Gerry Connolly asserted that although Egypt and the US are allies, Hegazy’s case will not be forgotten.

“The Egyptian government mistakes American resolve," he stated, "They think that because we care about the broader, 30,000-foot relationship, we won't get into the nitty-gritty about individual human rights. Wrong. This case will continue to be elevated.”

Alaa Hegazy, Aya’s sister, who was also at the press conference stated that although her sister has been in good spirits, she was not sure how much longer that would last. "We're worried that Aya's resolve is beginning to crack," she said.

Wade McMullen, a lawyer with the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights organization, who has worked with Aya Hegazy told AP that she has been banned from seeing her husband or conversing with other inmates during her detention.

Alaa Hegazy also stated that the charges against her sister were “absolutely absurd and unfounded.”

She explained to AP that the charges could only be understood in the context of the Egyptian state’s larger crackdown on intellectuals, academics and others it perceives to be a threat to its authority.

Hegazy’s detention has been widely condemned by rights groups both locally and internationally. Local NGOs issued a statement in May condemning the continued detention of the defendants in the case. The statement broadly condemned the Egyptian state’s practice of pretrial detention, stating that it is tantamount to a prison sentence elongated indefinitely through appeals to bureaucratic process, adding that it functions as, “a form of punishment in and of itself, a means to retaliate against activists unrelated to any legal grounds for detention.”

European-based rights organizations issued a statement in May in support of the eight defendants, expressing “serious concerns about the fairness of the Belady Foundation trial.”

The EuroMed Rights group and the Bar Human Rights Committee of England and Wales called on Egyptian judicial authorities "to order the conditional release on bail of Ms Hegazy, as well as the remaining defendants and to proceed speedily towards a swift and robust evaluation of the prosecution evidence.”