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Africa North
Egypt detains activists for 15 days, including a well-known blogger
2006-05-08
Instapundit has the Egyptian embassy contact details.
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's prosecutor general ordered eight activists held for 15 days on Monday, a day after police picked them up at a protest in support of other detained pro-reform activists, security officials said. "The detained people are charged with disrupting traffic, obstructing the state from carrying out its duties and insulting the president," one of the security officials said.

Police earlier said they had picked up 10 people at Sunday's demonstration of about 30 people outside a court in Cairo but had freed them all on the same day. Activists said police detained 11 people and released three. The activists said police encircled and beat them before dragging away specific activists, including Alaa Seif al-Islam, who maintains a pro-reform Web log. The activists staged the courthouse protest in support of about 40 people detained at demonstrations over the last two weeks, they said.

The authorities have not confirmed the number of people in custody after the previous demonstrations, organised to show support for two judges facing disciplinary procedures after criticising official abuses during last year's elections. Egypt, which last year came under U.S. pressure to carry out political reform, last month renewed its decades-old emergency laws which give the state wide powers of detention. The government says the legal provision is used to combat terrorism and drug trafficking. Activists say it is used to limit political life in the Arab world's most populous country.
Posted by:ryuge

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