Last month Mahmoud Mekki and Hesham Bastawisi, deputies of the chief justice of the Cassation Court, were charged with violating judicial rules by talking to the media about political issues and with harming the image of the judiciary by accusing fellow judges of taking part in rigging last year's parliamentary elections. The two were also accused of leaking to the press a black list including the initials of names of judges suspected of rigging.
Last week, the Arab Center for the Independence of the Judiciary and the Legal Profession said that it is "concerned with the conditions of justice and the independence of the Judiciary" and along with, the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), it sent a letter to President Mubarak, the Justice Minister Mahmoud Abul-Leil.
The two letters expressed the ICJ's "concern about the conditions of independence of the Judiciary in Egypt, as well as the Commission's concerns about the investigation with judges who are deputies to the head of Egypt's Court of Cassation."
Meanwhile, in what may very well be a first, sitting Egyptians judges have penned an opinion piece in a major foreign newspaper. Mahmoud Mekky and Hisham al-Bastawisy wrote this article in the British Guardian outlining their views, thus considerably widening the audience for this remarkable drama. Particularly notable are the two judges’ firm avowals of self-reliance in their battle for autonomy. As is to be expected, powerful third parties are now intensely interested in what used to be the marginal and rarefied affair of Egyptian judicial independence, viz. American and European governments. The article goes on, “In Egypt we don’t have any confidence in US policy because it is a contradictory policy that pays lip service to democracy while supporting dictatorships. We have confidence in the Egyptian people. We welcome support from any quarter, but we won’t rely on it. We will depend on ourselves in our campaign for reform and change.”
According to the blog Baheyya organised elements of the Egyptian public continue to declare their solidarity with judges. There are now some 100 activists of all political persuasions being detained for their unceasing support of the judges, among them three women activists (Nada al-Qassas, Asma’ Ali, Rasha ‘Azab), feisty bloggers-demonstrators Alaa Abdel Fattah, Malek Mustafa, and Muhammad al-Sharqawi, veteran demonstrator Kamal Khalil, journalists Ibrahim al-Sahari and Saher Gad, and some 50 members of the Muslim Brothers.
A medley of “Egyptian National Forces” have signed a short statement calling for the release of all detainees and reaffirming solidarity with judges. The signatories are Kifaya, the Nasserist Party, the Communist Party, Freedom Now, the Muslim Brothers, the 9 March movement for university’s independence, Writers and Artists for Change, The Street is Ours, Journalists for Change, the Egyptian Socialist Party, the Tagammu’ Party, the Socialist People’s Party, the Labour Party, the Ghad Party, the Karama Party, Youth for Change, the Revolutionary Socialists Organisation, the Pharmacists’ and Physicians Syndicates.
The following short report is from Albawaba. The next and longer article is from AFP via Middle East Times.
Police clash with demonstrators in Cairo
Violent clashes have reported between Egyptian riot police and demonstrators supporting two pro-reform judges who accused the judiciary of helping to rig last year's parliamentary elections.
Several hundred protestors from the Muslim Brotherhood, the Kefaya movement as well as leftist bodies gathered in downtown Cairo and were surrounded by thousands of policemen. "Dozens of members of the Muslim Brothers were arrested," the opposition Islamist movement's spokesman Issam al-Aryan told AFP.
Large sections of central Cairo were sealed off to traffic as the political opposition and reformists clashed with state security forces.
An AFP reporter saw one protestor lying on the ground being kicked in the stomach by policemen and several others with bloodied faces being whisked away in police vans.
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Egypt police and pro-reform protestors clash
Violent clashes broke out on Thursday between Egyptian riot police and demonstrators supporting two pro-reform judges who accused the judiciary of helping to rig last year's parliamentary elections.
Several hundred protestors from the Muslim Brotherhood, the Kifaya movement as well as leftist organizations gathered in downtown Cairo and were surrounded by thousands of policemen.
Riot police wearing helmets were seen beating up protestors with truncheons.
"Dozens of members of the Muslim Brothers were arrested," said spokesman Issam Al Aryan, whose Islamist opposition movement was for the first time taking part in a demonstration of support for the judges.
Large sections of central Cairo were sealed off to traffic as the political opposition and reformists faced off with state security forces.
"Judges, protect us from dictatorship," chanted the protestors, who split into at least three separate demonstrations in a bid to avoid being encircled by the police.
An AFP reporter saw one protestor lying on the ground being kicked in the stomach by policemen and several others with bloodied faces being whisked away in police vans.
Several journalists were also manhandled by security, including a cameraman for the Qatar-based news network Al Jazeera who was badly beaten and had his equipment confiscated, witnesses said.
Mohammed Abdel Quddus, a prominent member of the journalists syndicate's board, was arrested early on Thursday at a cafe near the courthouse.
The two rebel judges, Mahmoud Mekki and Hisham Al Bastawissi, refused to enter the courtroom, where their case was supposed to be reviewed, claiming that their defense team was not allowed to come with them.
"I will no longer attend the hearings of the disciplinary board if the conditions for a fair trial are not met," Bastawissi said.
The hearing went ahead without the pair, who demanded that their lawyers be allowed in, that all security forces vacate the building and that all protestors detained for supporting them be released.
The trial was adjourned until May 18.
"What is happening today is an unprecedented scandal. The judges all refused to enter the courthouse, which is besieged by thousands of police forces who are interfering with the country's judiciary," Bastawissi added.
The two judges were summoned to a disciplinary hearing last month on charges of tarnishing the image of the judiciary by naming some of their pro-government colleagues in connection with election fraud.
Their summons triggered street protests in favor of the judges, who are in charge of supervising the electoral process and have become one of the symbols of the drive for reforms in Egypt.
Clashes between police and the protestors also erupted at the previous hearing on April 27 but the protestors were in fewer numbers.
According to Human Rights Watch, more than 100 pro-reform activists have been detained over the past two weeks in connection with the movement to support the judges and the campaign to repeal Egypt's state of emergency law, which has been in place since 1981.
"These new arrests indicate that President [Hosni] Mubarak intends to silence all peaceful opposition," Joe Stork, the rights watchdog's deputy regional director, said in a statement.
Only two years ago, street protests in Cairo were almost unimaginable, but Mubarak had loosened his iron grip on the state amid pressure from Washington to allow greater political freedom in Egypt.
Now observers and critics argue that the regime is reverting to its old tactics and is seeking to gag all dissident voices as Washington has turned its attention to other regional issues.
Mubarak's ruling National Democratic Party retained a firm grip on power during the November-December legislative elections despite a surge from the Muslim Brothers, who a secured a fifth of parliament.
The judges syndicate is dominated by reformists and has been pushing for full independence from the ministry of justice.
The group took its confrontation with the regime a step further after the April 27 protests when it issued a statement openly calling for change in the higher spheres of government.
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