In this issue of Deleted Lines, we examine an interconnected landscape of human rights violations in Egypt: systematic torture in detention, the growing targeting of children, activists and political opponents, deepening healthcare crises, and weakening legal safeguards for refugees and prisoners. Through documented testimony and careful reporting, we present the forms of repression affecting public life, from police stations and prisons to courts and healthcare facilities.
The arrest of Egyptian opposition figure Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh’s son
Human rights organizations expressed grave concern about the trial of Ahmed Aboul Fotouh, son of Dr. Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh, leader of the Strong Egypt Party, before an Emergency State Security Criminal Court. Its first hearing was scheduled for Sunday, April 27, following his publication of information about abuses suffered by his father in prison.
The organizations stressed that this exceptional court fails to provide even minimum fair-trial guarantees. They called for all charges against Ahmed to be dropped and for an end to policies tightening security control over public life and targeting political activists and their families.
Security forces arrested Ahmed on April 16 at the Katameya traffic department while he was renewing his driving licence, enforcing a 15-year sentence handed down in absentia by an Emergency State Security Court in May 2022 in a case dating from 2021.
According to the papers in Emergency State Security felony case 1059/2021, registered as New Cairo comprehensive case 707/2021, he is accused of joining a terrorist group with knowledge of its purposes. In the same case, his father received 15 years’ rigorous imprisonment; his deputy Mohamed El-Qassas and former Tanta University student union vice-president Moaz El-Sharqawi each received ten years.
Alaa Abdel Fattah’s health deteriorates after more than 50 days on hunger strike
The family of Egyptian opposition figure Alaa Abdel Fattah renewed their fears for his life as his health deteriorated after more than 50 days on hunger strike. The 42-year-old British-Egyptian remains imprisoned despite completing his sentence last September. His family appealed to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer to help secure his release.
In a Facebook statement, the family said his health had worsened significantly since he began his third hunger strike on March 1 in solidarity with his mother’s partial hunger strike for his freedom. He suffers from vomiting, severe gastroenteritis, exhaustion and chronic oesophagitis; after the prolonged strike, his body rejects prescribed medicines.
Dr. Laila Soueif has spent seven months on hunger strike to demand the release of her son, who has completed his lawful term of imprisonment. His sister Sanaa Seif urgently appealed to Starmer to press the Egyptian authorities on his case.
On the April 6 anniversary, Mohamed Adel’s wife calls for his release
Rofayda Hamdy, wife of political activist Mohamed Adel, demanded his release after more than 11 years in prison, during the movement’s seminar “April 6: Between Past and Future.” Participants discussed major milestones and memories of the youth movement, its future and lessons from its experience.
Hamdy appealed to President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi to pardon her husband. None of his cases involved incitement to violence, she said; the charges were limited to publishing or broadcasting false news and protesting. “If he made a mistake from the state’s perspective, he and his family have already been punished for 11 years.”
Speaking to Zawia3, she expressed frustration: she had “taken every possible step” to obtain a positive outcome and no longer knew what else she could do. Intermediaries, including MPs and party leaders, had repeatedly promised his release on different occasions without results. She still hopes a presidential pardon will let him return to his family after years of suffering.
33 rights organizations call for poet Abdulrahman Yusuf’s release
In a joint letter to the British foreign secretary and the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, 33 human rights organizations demanded urgent intervention to end the arbitrary detention of poet and democracy advocate Abdulrahman Yusuf Al-Qaradawi. He was forcibly transferred to the United Arab Emirates on January 8, 2025, and has been forcibly disappeared ever since.
On March 5, 2025, the United Nations called on the UAE to disclose his whereabouts and fate immediately. UN experts warned of grave human rights abuses, saying their worst fears about his treatment if extradited appeared to have materialized.
Lebanese authorities arrested him on December 28, 2024, following a UAE extradition request alleging false information and incitement to disorder over a video criticizing Egyptian, Emirati and Saudi policies. Despite his lawyers’ appeal, he was forcibly transferred by private plane on January 8 without fair legal procedures.
El-Tantawy faces a new case
Egyptian opposition figure and former presidential candidate Ahmed El-Tantawy was released on Sunday, April 27, hours after appearing before the Supreme State Security Prosecution in a new investigation, lawyer Khaled Ali announced on Facebook. The summons came weeks before his expected release at the end of May 2025, after serving the sentence imposed following his arrest on May 27, 2024.
On that date, a misdemeanour appeals court rejected his appeal against a one-year prison term and a five-year ban on standing in any election, including the coming parliamentary elections. It upheld sentences against him, campaign director Mohamed Aboul Diyar and 21 other campaign members for circulating presidential-election papers without official authorization by inviting citizens to sign popular endorsements. El-Tantawy later withdrew from the presidential race after failing to obtain the required number of legal endorsements.
Separately, on Saturday, April 26, the Supreme State Security Prosecution released activist Ahmed Douma on EGP 10,000 bail in case 2563/2025, on charges of publishing false news inside and outside Egypt. Prosecutors questioned him about Facebook posts entitled “A Span and a Fist,” describing Egyptian prison conditions and prisoners’ treatment.
Douma unexpectedly received a summons on Wednesday, April 23, without prior knowledge of the case. The notification reached his Damanhour residence a day after the April 22 hearing date, so the prosecution postponed questioning until April 26.
Speaking to Zawia3, Douma said he had been questioned in two cases over five months, alongside another investigation alleging contempt of religion and insulting God over his poetry collection Curly. That case had been referred to an Al-Azhar committee, though he had not yet been summoned. The allegations against him concern publishing and broadcasting false news at home and abroad that purportedly harms national interests, destabilizes the country and spreads public panic.
Speculation about these cases is meaningless, he said, but his experience shows that the threat of imprisonment is becoming harsher and more violent. “One of these summonses will mean entering and then being arrested. We do not know when or why, but this is the pattern we are seeing.” He believes the latest case stems from his firsthand account, in the “A Span and a Fist” series, of a detainee tortured to death.
“It is frightening that recounting what happened to you in detention can become a legal justification for renewed arrest, or for continuing to drain you physically, psychologically and financially,” he concluded.
This is not his first State Security investigation since his 2023 presidential pardon. In November 2024, case 5892/2024 concerned tweets questioning a German ship’s entry into Alexandria carrying explosives for Israeli arms manufacturers, and an Israeli warship’s passage through the Suez Canal. He was released on EGP 20,000 bail. Douma received a presidential pardon on August 19, 2023, among prisoners with final convictions.
Forced departure: lawyers in exile
In On the Way Home, the Homeland Closed: Testimonies of the Forced Wandering of Egyptian Human Rights Lawyers, Zawia3 documented lawyers’ transformation from defenders in courtrooms into defendants in security cases, followed by forced departure into an unfamiliar exile. About 25 human rights lawyers now live outside Egypt, estimated at around 40% of human rights lawyers abroad.
Some were arrested and placed alongside their clients in the very cases they were defending. Mohamed El-Baqer was arrested in 2019 at the Supreme State Security Prosecution while representing programmer Alaa Abdel Fattah. He was added to the same case and sentenced to four years in December 2021. Although pardoned in 2023, he remains on terrorism lists and banned from travel, according to a joint report submitted by 12 rights organizations to the UN before Egypt’s January 28 human rights review.
There is no precise count of imprisoned lawyers. In 2017, Ezzat Ghoneim, director of the Egyptian Coordination for Rights and Freedoms, estimated 134 lawyers were detained or serving sentences. Ghoneim himself was arrested in 2018 and sentenced in 2023 to 15 years’ rigorous imprisonment in a trial criticized by rights groups. The “Free Them” campaign, defending lawyers imprisoned since 2013, estimated about 300 arrested lawyers at its founding conference in 2015.
Extrajudicial killing
The Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms demanded an urgent, transparent investigation into the death of Mahmoud Mohamed Mahmoud Asaad, known as “Mahmoud Mika,” in Cairo’s El-Khalifa police station on April 10, 2025, and accountability for all involved.
The commission expressed grave concern after his family found marks of severe beating and torture while washing his body. Lawyers were denied the forensic report, amid allegations of a cover-up.
Security forces arrested Mika, a 26-year-old reinforced-concrete carpenter, on the evening of March 6 while he stood with his mother outside a dairy shop. According to the family’s lawyer, officers provided neither a legal reason nor a judicial warrant. They took him to El-Khalifa station and later accused him of drug trafficking, though his lawyer could not inspect the seized evidence.
Zawia3 contacted the family about the events, which began with his arrest on the seventh day of Ramadan and ended with their announcement of his death on Saturday evening, April 12.
His mother recalled going with Mahmoud and his sister to buy suhoor food in Imam El-Shafie. A police officer stopped Mahmoud and took him away in a tuk-tuk, without searching him or first accusing him of anything. Mahmoud insisted on being searched before leaving, but the officer refused and told him to come quietly.
Other young men were being arrested in the same street. Hours later the family learned he was at El-Khalifa station and had been accused of possessing and trafficking drugs. They tried to bring food and essentials, but officers said he had been moved to a punishment room without explanation. This continued for several days. A day before his death, his mother begged to see him; an officer initially agreed, then reversed the decision after speaking to another officer. On Saturday morning she learned he had died after being unable to attend a prosecution hearing.
Read Zawia3’s detailed report: Torture Marks and Suspension by the Hands: Details of Mahmoud Asaad’s Death at El-Khalifa Police Station.
Women detained and two young men killed in El-Negaila
Fourteen rights organizations condemned the extrajudicial killing of two young men in Marsa Matrouh and the arbitrary arrest of dozens of women. They demanded urgent, impartial and independent investigations and justice for those responsible.
In a report published on April 11, Zawia3 documented escalating events in El-Negaila following the deaths of three police personnel during an attempt to arrest a man sentenced to 35 years on April 9. Security forces detained around 20 female relatives of suspects, reportedly to pressure the wanted men into surrendering. Residents condemned detention without legal grounds as a blatant violation of basic rights and a return to discredited security practices.
The Interior Ministry denied detaining women, but eyewitnesses interviewed by Zawia3 confirmed dawn raids and the detention of about 20 relatives. They described older women, mothers and homemakers unconnected to the incident. The resulting anger prompted residents and tribal elders to intervene.
Former local bar head and defence lawyer Mamdouh Darbala told Zawia3 that after a clash killed three security personnel and the suspects escaped, officers arrested 23 women the following morning. Under pressure from families and lawyers, around 19 were released while four remained held.
Two relatives, aged 17 and 18, then surrendered under the supervision of elders, insisting they were innocent and unconnected to the police killings. They offered themselves in place of the women until the suspects were captured. According to Darbala, officers took Youssef Eid Fadl El-Sarhani and Farag Rabash El-Fazari to the Salloum road and shot them dead outside the law, despite their innocence. This ignited anger and warnings of a looming disaster.
Nearly two weeks later, the investigation remained stalled despite defence lawyers’ and community leaders’ pressure. Victims’ families and rights organizations called for stronger legal and public action to obtain justice.
Defence members and informed sources told Zawia3 that the National Security officer accused of killing the youths had still not appeared before investigators. Indirect pressure continued on families and representatives to drop the case or accept blood money in return for calm, which they rejected. Calls also emerged for shops from Salloum to Zawyet Abdel Qader to strike from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. in the middle of the week to press for justice.
Read the detailed reports: Women Detained, Young Men Killed: What We Know about El-Negaila in Matrouh and El-Negaila: National Security Officer Accused of Killing Two Young Men Has Not Yet Been Questioned.
Live ammunition used against Warraq Island residents
Rights groups and opposition parties expressed grave concern and condemned repeated attacks on Warraq Island, escalating on Saturday, April 12, just 17 days after similar police violence on March 26. That earlier incident led to the arrest of 12 island residents and four supporters from Shubra, and a residents’ sit-in demanding their release.
On April 12, Zawia3 documented live ammunition against residents as renewed clashes erupted over the blockade of the Nile ferry connecting the island to Shubra El-Kheima. Security forces continued preventing building materials from entering, which residents saw as another attempt to force them to leave and sell their property for investment projects.
Eyewitnesses and social-media videos showed tear gas and birdshot used against people protesting the ban and the ferry’s detention for a second consecutive day. Witnesses estimated around 50 people were injured, some seriously, amid mounting anger.
Residents said tension began in the morning when young men gathered at a café near a police checkpoint awaiting friends’ release after an earlier dispute. An officer buying coffee argued with them and struck one young man, triggering a clash. Witnesses also reported five people detained from their homes and four arrested in the street that day.
One resident said disorder and clashes continued and confirmed live fire against protesters. He sent exclusive photographs of a 16-year-old shot in both feet, with injuries he said would require amputation.
These events form part of security attempts to clear the island and forcibly displace residents in the name of redevelopment. Residents say they support development, but demand consultation and a guaranteed right to return rather than forced removal.
Read the detailed report: Warraq Island: Zawia3 Documents Live Fire against Residents.
New investigation: entrenched torture and responsibility across security and judicial bodies
The Egyptian Front for Human Rights’ report, “No Retreat from Torture in Egypt: Different Perpetrators, Systematic and Shared Methods,” analysed 569 documented testimonies of pretrial torture between 2013 and 2021. It found a recurring, systematic pattern rather than isolated individual acts, involving multiple security and judicial bodies.
Authorities had taken no serious steps to stop torture, despite seven years having passed since the UN Committee against Torture’s June 2017 recommendations to end torture and ill-treatment and prosecute perpetrators. The gap between constitutional and legal commitments and practice widened; no substantial legal reforms were made, and major loopholes continued enabling impunity.
Testimony in 12 prominent cases covered electric shocks, suspension, the “grill” position, stripping, beating, burns from fire or caustic substances, threats, sleep deprivation, prolonged standing and gunfire. Electric shocks to genitals and restraints and electric wires attached to extremities caused permanent injuries in some cases.
The report identified National Security, civilian police and general and military intelligence as perpetrators. It also implicated the Supreme State Security and Military Prosecutions through ignored complaints or abuses within their premises. Prosecutors extensively relied on confessions extracted under torture without independent investigations, ignoring most complaints and authorizing only limited medical examinations in a few cases.
Emergency State Security Courts and exceptional prosecution bodies continued operating despite the formal end of the emergency in October 2021. The 2021 National Human Rights Strategy did not resolve torture: investigative and accountability mechanisms remained subject to the same security agencies accused of violations.
The Egyptian Front called for deep legal and procedural reforms: a torture definition aligned with international standards, Criminal Procedure Code amendments ensuring independent and impartial investigations, prosecution of perpetrators, adequate compensation for victims and families under UN standards, and an end to legally entrenched impunity.
A prisoner attempts suicide
The “No Statute of Limitations” campaign demanded immediate disclosure of the fate of 29-year-old prisoner Alaa Gamal after a suicide attempt inside Badr 3 Rehabilitation and Reform Centre. His family had received no official or documented information about his health.
Serving 15 years, Gamal attempted suicide on April 15 after a long ban on family visits and the administration’s recent refusal to admit items brought by his relatives. The campaign said officials put him in a punishment cell after he threatened suicide, prompting the attempt.
The campaign noted that Mohamed Hassan Hilal had died in Badr 3 on April 8 amid suspicions of torture. Around 12 deaths had been recorded since prisoners began transferring there in June 2022. It demanded an urgent, transparent investigation into what it described as ongoing systematic abuses, and accountability to stop their recurrence.
Rats in Abdel Khalek Farouk’s cell
Economist Dr. Abdel Khalek Farouk’s wife sent telegram 2242001991 to the prosecutor general after discovering large mountain rats in his cell during her March 31, 2025 visit. She caught and killed one, but the prison administration failed to respond to her report.
Farouk had already complained of poor detention conditions during his January 7, 2025 remand hearing before the State Security Prosecution. Security forces arrested him at home on October 21, 2024; he is detained in case 4937/2024 on charges of publishing false news and joining a terrorist group.
The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) urged Prosecutor General Mohamed Shawky and Interior Minister Mahmoud Tawfik to promptly examine his wife’s three complaints about health requirements in his cell.
Journalist Khaled Mamdouh and cartoonist Ashraf Omar’s detention renewed
On Tuesday, April 15, Badr Criminal Court’s consultation chamber renewed Al-Manassa cartoonist Ashraf Omar’s pretrial detention for 45 days in State Security case 1968/2024, rights lawyer Khaled Ali told Al-Manassa.
Omar faces charges of publishing and broadcasting false news, misusing social media and joining a group established contrary to law. Plainclothes officers raided his home on July 22, 2024, taking him handcuffed and blindfolded to an unknown location. After two days of enforced disappearance, he appeared before State Security prosecutors, who ordered 15 days’ detention. He has remained in pretrial custody ever since.
Cairo’s terrorism criminal court, First Circuit, also renewed journalist Khaled Mamdouh’s detention for 45 days in Supreme State Security case 1282/2024. Accused of false news and knowingly joining a terrorist group, he was arrested at his Mokattam home at dawn on July 16, 2024, without a judicial warrant or announced charges, according to his family.
Calls to release two children detained for a year
EIPR called on Prosecutor General Mohamed Shawky to release the children “M.M.” and “A.M.” and investigate their unlawful detention for more than a year in Dar El-Salam police station.
They were arrested in March 2024 with four adults over pro-Palestine writing on Dar El-Salam bridge in Cairo. In Supreme State Security case 952/2024, prosecutors accused them of joining a terrorist group, publishing false news harmful to public security and order, and using social-media accounts to publish the statements.
On March 8, ten security personnel arrested M.M. at home, seizing his phone, laptop, Palestinian flag and drawings. His mother could not locate him during two weeks of enforced disappearance, in violation of the law. EIPR demanded an investigation into that disappearance and the continued detention of a child with a broken leg, rejecting the children’s unlawful conditions.
Former detainees demand the release of Palestine solidarity prisoners
A group released a year ago in case 1567/2024 called for the release of all detainees imprisoned for solidarity with Palestine. Some have been held for over a year and a half. The group urged freedom for 130 remaining detainees, including three who were children at arrest, charged over peaceful solidarity.
Their statement said their own release following the peaceful women’s demonstration outside UN Women in April last year brought joy to them and their loved ones. Others remain imprisoned for exercising the right to express support through social-media writing, banners, graffiti or prayers in mosques.
They called for reconsideration of the prisoners’ situation amid Palestine’s current ordeal. Supporting Palestine is not a crime; expression is constitutionally and legally protected and must not be punished with imprisonment. They appealed for an end to detainees’ and families’ suffering and affirmed continued hope for justice and freedom.
The new Labour Law passes despite objections
In mid-April, Egypt’s House of Representatives gave final approval to the new Labour Law after years of promises to regulate employment relations and protect private-sector workers. Approval followed committee discussions and official assurances of a more stable workplace, workers’ rights and stronger investment.
Labour organizations and social researchers criticized the law as restricting rather than protecting rights. Objections include tight limits on strikes, exclusion of domestic workers and dismissal through drug testing without sufficient defence guarantees.
Rights groups warned of weaker social justice, particularly exemptions allowing struggling companies to withhold periodic wage increases amid inflation. They also warned that multiple new councils could duplicate responsibilities and waste resources.
Hassan Barbary, labour researcher at the Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights (ECESR), told Zawia3 that actual procedures began only after more than 11 years of repeated unfulfilled promises. The centre and other labour specialists studied an initial draft and submitted comments, but days before approval a different version appeared, raising questions about meaningful social dialogue.
Barbary criticized bans on strikes during collective bargaining, mediation and arbitration, which remove workers’ main peaceful pressure tool. Workers in vital and strategic establishments are also prohibited from striking. He asked how one law could remove a fundamental right from one group, and why special arrangements or the Civil Service Law were not used instead of undermining the constitutional right to strike.
He said the periodic increase was set at 3% of insured wages, equivalent to about 7% of basic pay, below the previous rate. Worse, struggling employers can seek exemption from annual increases. “How can a struggling employer be exempted from obligations to workers, while remaining obliged to pay taxes to the state?”
Excluding domestic workers contradicts official recognition of the need to regulate their position, he said: if irregular workers receive some coverage, why exclude a vulnerable group lacking any legal protection? He also warned that training and human-resource councils overlap with existing bodies. Labour supply companies may collect 2% of workers’ wages for an agreed period in addition to employers’ payments, an unjustified drain on salaries.
On drug testing, Barbary cited abuses and arbitrary dismissals under the Civil Service Law. Applying it to private-sector workers could hand employers a dismissal weapon without clear standards or genuine safeguards, exposing workers to job loss without objective reasons.
Recommended reading: The New Labour Law: A Step Forward or a Setback for Workers’ Rights?
The Minya crash: rights groups condemn neglect and child labour
A tragic collision on the Western Desert Road near Tuna El-Gabal in Mallawi, Minya, killed eight children and injured 25 other agricultural workers. A truck carrying them to farms crashed, claiming many young victims seeking a livelihood. The incident again exposed unsafe transport and harsh agricultural work amid weak oversight and ignored safety standards.
Civil-society organizations said this was a direct consequence of policies marginalizing workers, especially millions in agriculture without protection. They condemned dangerous child labour and inadequate transport regulation, calling for effective prohibition of child labour, safe transport, fair wages and humane conditions.
The New Woman Foundation held an entire system responsible for marginalizing poor people and denying basic labour rights. It said the crash reflected a lack of political will to protect agricultural workers, who lack social insurance and occupational safety. Unsafe vehicles, long hours, inadequate equipment and training reflect absent social justice rather than coincidence.
The foundation renewed calls for official recognition of agricultural workers under the Labour Law and National Occupational Safety Strategy, enforcement of employers’ safe-transport obligations, effective child-labour bans, and economic and social alternatives for poor rural families. The victims were not merely “truck passengers,” but lives lost to the absence of protection and dignity. It rejected normalizing suffering or reducing those killed while earning a living to passing news statistics.
Recommended reading: Worker Safety in Egypt: Absent Oversight and Repeated Fatal Accidents
The right to health
In April, 117 doctors resigned from Alexandria University hospitals and the Medical Research Institute, exposing the continuing loss of skilled staff abroad. Around 220,000 doctors are registered with the Medical Syndicate, including approximately 120,000 working outside Egypt. In 2022 alone, 4,000 doctors resigned from the government sector.
EIPR described retaining doctors as a critical, longstanding and worsening issue in a system already suffering severe shortages. It warned of declining effectiveness and growing inability to deliver adequate care. Addressing the roots requires comprehensive analysis of working conditions and a critical examination of healthcare from doctors’ perspective to identify retention policies.
Its 2021 study analysed doctors’ circumstances and proposed feasible solutions, examining work conditions alongside health financing, governance, leadership, access to medicines and service delivery. It urged dialogue among stakeholders to improve doctors’ conditions.
Dr. Mohamed Hassan Khalil, head of the Committee for the Right to Health, told Zawia3 that around 120,000 active doctors are registered with the Egyptian Medical Syndicate, while 130,000–150,000 Egyptians practise abroad, mainly in the Gulf, Europe, the United States and Canada. Despite recent decline, demand reflects a 200-year tradition: Egypt’s first modern medical school, also the first in Africa and the Middle East, was founded under Mohamed Ali, and Kasr El-Aini enjoyed an international reputation in the 1940s.
He said Egypt suffers severe brain drain because its doctors’ pay is the lowest in Africa. The country had one doctor per 1,000 citizens in the 1960s; he described today’s ratio as 1.1%, still far below the global average and the WHO recommendation of at least three doctors per 1,000. He called for attractive pay and a strategic health-workforce policy. He considered the 2025–2026 health allocation of 2.2% insulting, noting constitutional commitments to spend 20% of GDP on health, education and research and the 2014 drafting committee’s health benchmark of at least 6%.
On World Health Day, April 7, ECESR issued recommendations affirming health as a fundamental human right and integral economic and social right. It demanded serious commitment to comprehensive, equitable care, particularly for marginalized groups.
Recommendations included fair access, higher public allocations, better infrastructure, prevention and awareness, updated legislation and attention to workers’ mental health within occupational safety standards. Its earlier policy paper, “Workers’ Psychological and Mental Health: A Right Neglected in Occupational Health and Safety Standards,” examined work-related pressures and called for laws and prevention policies ensuring physically and psychologically safe workplaces.
On March 20, the Official Gazette published the cabinet’s decision granting management, operation and development of Dar El-Salam Oncology Hospital, formerly Hermel, to Elevate Private Equity in partnership with France’s Gustave Roussy International. Renamed “Gustave Roussy International – Egypt,” it became part of the government’s public-private healthcare partnership plan under the new concession law. Patients feared for free and state-funded treatment.
The decision rests on Law 87/2024 regulating concessions for public healthcare facilities, ratified by President El-Sisi on June 23, 2024, and published in Official Gazette issue 25 bis. It regulates establishment, operation and development by concession, excluding basic care units, family health centres, and blood and plasma operations governed by Law 8/2021, except complementary services. Critics feared reduced state responsibility for free care and support for poor patients, and uncertainty over staff transferred to private management.
In Who Is Responsible for Hermel Oncology Patients’ Suffering after Privatization?, Zawia3 documented crowding, medicine shortages and refusal of new childhood cancer cases after the contract announcement. Health-rights experts warned that Law 87/2024 could privatize many hospitals, weaken state-funded treatment, reduce citizens’ access to public beds and increase costs through higher fees.
Meanwhile, shortages linked to the dollar’s rise have affected around a thousand medicines, including treatments for hypertension, diabetes, heart, gallbladder, thyroid, kidney and stomach disorders, familial Mediterranean fever and cancer, nasal drops for infants and adults, cold remedies and gynaecological medicines. Pharmaceutical Industry Chamber head Gamal El-Leithy estimated in February that shortages affected 30–40% of the market, including 15% of medicines with no alternatives.
Patients are trapped between rising prices and absent effective substitutes. Despite official efforts and optimistic statements, thousands, particularly cancer and kidney-failure patients, face daily struggles to obtain treatment.
Read the detailed report: Medicine Shortages Compound the Suffering of Cancer and Kidney-Failure Patients.
Refugee rights
In April, Amnesty International urged Egypt to stop plans to forcibly return a Syrian asylum seeker at risk of deportation and to end its crackdown on followers of the Ahmadi Religion of Peace and Light.
It documented at least four arbitrary detentions between March 8 and 14, 2025, for peacefully exercising freedom of religion and belief. Four men were arrested at homes in three governorates, including 28-year-old Syrian asylum seeker Ahmed El-Tinawi, registered with UNHCR and facing imminent deportation. Three were subsequently forcibly disappeared, while the fourth remained in solitary, incommunicado detention.
Amnesty said the campaign followed a member’s posting of a banner advertising the religion’s “The Mahdi Has Appeared” television channel and a leader’s photograph on a Giza footbridge in early March. Police arrested him on March 8 and released him without charge later that day, according to UK-based Egyptian community representative Imran Ali and another member who contacted him after release.
On March 11, plainclothes police arrested Ahmed Mohamed Hassan El-Tinawi and his brother Hussein, also registered with UNHCR, at their October 6 City home without a warrant, a relative said. Ahmed was held alone at First October 6 police station; Hussein’s whereabouts remained unknown. On March 15, an officer informally told an EIPR lawyer Ahmed was accused of joining a terrorist organization. Hussein’s family complained to prosecutors on March 25, in a document reviewed by Amnesty and EIPR, but received no answer.
On March 13, authorities moved Ahmed to the Passports, Immigration and Nationality department in Abbasiya, forcing him to sign apparent deportation papers without reading them. On April 6, police forced his family to buy a ticket to Syria, threatening to withhold heart medication. On March 10, officers violently raided Omar Mahmoud Abdel Meguid Mohamed Ibrahim’s Cairo home and arrested him; his fate and whereabouts remained unknown.
A relative told Amnesty the home remained under constant police surveillance and was searched again that day for Omar’s brother-in-law Hazem Said Mohamed Abdel Moatamed, who escaped but was arrested three days later, on March 13, in Tenth of Ramadan City, Sharqia, and forcibly disappeared.
On April 10, EIPR disclosed that Egypt had deported Ahmed El-Tinawi, despite his lawful residence and Egypt’s Refugee Convention obligations prohibiting forced return to the country a refugee fled.
Refugees Platform in Egypt also accused authorities of successive security instructions concerning registered and unregistered Syrians, residents and new arrivals, through the Interior Ministry’s immigration department in late December 2024 and early January 2025. Issued unofficially after the Assad regime’s fall, none appeared in the Official Gazette. Some were announced through security sources in the media; others were applied without announcement.
The platform’s April research paper reviewed Syrians’ legal situation, policy changes since 2012, recent undocumented instructions and measures following the Syrian regime’s fall. It assessed their constitutionality, legality, humanity and compliance with international obligations, alongside profiteering from the Syrian crisis.
After the Syrian revolution began in March 2011, Egypt allowed Syrians to enter without prior visas or additional security clearance. Tourist residence permits lasting one to three months were readily available, allowing many to stay without seeking UNHCR asylum. In July 2013, prior visas and security approval became mandatory, except that holders of residence in the United States, Schengen area, Britain or Canada were exempted from security clearance. Travel companies began obtaining approvals under different Egyptian security agencies.
Sources said coordination since 2013 has involved companies affiliated with General Intelligence or Interior Ministry National Security, charging varying dollar fees per person. Approval authorizes entry for the visa’s duration, not residence. Syrians refer to these as National Security or intelligence visas according to the company’s affiliation.
Since late 2013, restrictions have obstructed access and family reunification. Registered refugees could not leave before closing their UNHCR files. Students and asylum seekers sought alternatives, including dangerous irregular journeys from Sudan across the desert, exposing them to exploitation and abuse. Without Egyptian search and rescue, dozens died. Removing legal protection encouraged hate speech and incitement in Egyptian media and covered abuses, including forced deportation, denied entry and removal without due process. UNHCR’s 2022 report recorded the forced return of five Syrians, three registered. The platform documented deportation orders against Khaled Riyad El-Khatib in February 2021 and Yamen Ibrahim El-Bitar in September 2022 on public-interest grounds without an opportunity to appeal.
The platform said tourist residence renewals were barred from July 2024. Syrians were told at different government offices to leave and re-enter every six months, without a formal decision. National Security approval became mandatory. Sources said files were being reviewed since early 2024 for public-security removal orders and coordination was limited to National Security companies. No tourist permits were issued during 2024; applications were rejected without clear explanation or ignored. Rejected applicants were given seven days to leave.
Families denied renewal also lost education access. Authorities raided and closed refugee community schools in Cairo, Giza and Alexandria, detained and deported teachers and pupils, and stopped non-Egyptians, including Syrians, under identity-check procedures.
Without official notice, Egypt ended Syrian children’s exemption from residence fees and demanded payments for past years. In August 2024, public-school registration was restricted to asylum-card holders with valid residence for both students and parents. Around 90% of Syrians do not hold asylum cards: UNHCR had registered approximately 150,000, compared with Egyptian government estimates of 1.5 million Syrians. The sudden decision shortly before the school year disrupted thousands of families, forcing many into expensive private education.
That month, visa and residence fee exemptions were also removed, with USD 25 charged under new rules. In September, study-residence fees rose by more than 200% without announcement, from EGP 2,100 to EGP 7,000. In October, university administrative-service fees applied to Syrians for the first time; prices doubled and payments were required in US dollars, the paper said.
The platform considered these restrictions on movement and residence to increase risks and deny rights, particularly access to asylum. It said they conflict with Egypt’s international non-discrimination obligations and non-refoulement, which forbids returning refugees to persecution or danger.
Recommended reading: Protection or Restrictions? Widespread Criticism of Egypt’s New Asylum Law
In a step described by observers as reform, Egypt and UNHCR announced an increase in daily asylum-permit processing capacity from 600 to around 1,000 people, after repeated complaints about crowding, particularly among Sudanese applicants. Though welcomed, it raised questions about adequacy, implementation speed and deeper asylum and residence challenges.
By the end of March 2025, around 942,000 refugees and asylum seekers from more than 60 nationalities were registered with UNHCR in Egypt. Sudanese formed the largest group, followed by Syrians, Eritreans, Ethiopians, South Sudanese, Somalis, Yemenis and Iraqis. Most live in Greater Cairo and Alexandria and rely on humanitarian aid amid economic pressures and difficulties entering formal employment.
Read the detailed report: Asylum Reforms in Egypt: A Positive Step, but Challenges Remain.
Zawia3 also documented Egyptians still trapped in Gaza after around a year and a half of Israel’s genocidal war. No official or unofficial estimate covers all Egyptian citizens remaining since October 7, but Zawia3 obtained a recent list of 229 stranded people: 213 Egyptian national-ID holders and 16 Palestinian wives of Egyptians or children still awaiting citizenship. Around 90 were women and girls, and at least nine were children, including four infants. Sources said more than 1,000 wanted to return to Egypt. Unofficial estimates placed Gaza’s Egyptian community at around 40,000 in 2015.
Read the full report: Amid Rubble, Bombardment and Hunger: Egyptians Trapped in Gaza for a Year and a Half.
Sudanese army advances in Khartoum and the Rapid Support Forces’ subsequent withdrawal prompted more Sudanese refugees in Egypt to decide to return voluntarily. During Eid El-Fitr, hundreds gathered on Cairo’s Faisal Street for buses through Halfa and Argeen crossings, under Sudanese civil-society and community initiatives.
Egypt is the largest host of Sudanese refugees. Government figures indicate more than 1.2 million Sudanese seeking international protection; UNHCR recorded 546,746 registered Sudanese, with others awaiting registration. Sudanese constituted roughly two-thirds of 827,644 registered refugees from 95 nationalities.
On April 1, the “Returning to the Land of Good People” initiative launched ten low-cost buses, offering free travel to low-income families and people with disabilities, founder and Sudanese community member Mohamed Suleiman told Zawia3.
Read the detailed report: Khartoum’s Liberation Prompts Sudanese Refugees in Egypt to Return Voluntarily.
Women’s rights
The New Woman Foundation issued an analytical paper, “A Feminist Reading of the Draft Unified Law against Violence against Women,” following an April 2024 consultation with feminist activists and groups.
Produced under the Diakonia-supported “Legislative Protection against Violence against Women” project, it examined the social and cultural need for a unified law through an intersectional feminist perspective attentive to women’s different experiences. It reviewed the draft prepared by a foundation-convened feminist task force, which combines punishment with protection, prevention and redress.
The paper noted absent political will in parliament despite repeated efforts and rising violence. In light of political and social changes and evolving feminist discourse, it reconsidered the task-force draft using consultation recommendations to identify possible interventions. It proposed recognition of violence as structural, requiring comprehensive institutional safeguards for protection and gender justice.
On April 19, the Egyptian Women’s Legal Assistance Foundation concluded the final workshop on a unified law against violence against women and girls with Tadwein for Gender Studies, the Cairo Foundation for Development and Law and the Egyptian Female Lawyers Initiative for Women’s Rights, under “Together against Violence against Women.”
Community dialogue across governorates produced recommendations on emerging public and private violence, including digital abuse, stronger protection for survivors and families, reduced impunity, and new reporting, complaint and investigation-follow-up tools. The legal committee outlined implementing regulations to clarify provisions, responsibilities and measures to protect and rehabilitate survivors if the proposal is enacted.
On April 12, the Supreme Constitutional Court, headed by Justice Boulos Fahmy Iskandar, ruled that a custodial mother’s right to the custody home ends when children reach the mandatory custody age, under Article 18 bis (third) of Decree-Law 25/1929, added by Law 100/1985.
In its judgment, the court said judicially authorized continued care beyond that age is voluntary retention, not an extension of mandatory custody, and creates no right to remain in the marital home.
The New Woman Foundation condemned the judgment as threatening children’s stability and disregarding custodial mothers. Although many courts already returned homes to fathers after the legal custody age, some had extended residence where children chose their mother, custody continued and no alternative home existed.
Article 20 of Law 20/1929, amended by Law 100/1985, ends women’s custody when a child reaches 15. A judge then asks the child whether to remain with the custodian without custody fees, until a boy reaches adulthood or a girl marries.
The foundation’s statement said the ruling permanently removes courts’ discretion to extend residence for social or humanitarian reasons. It addresses fathers’ property rights without considering children and mothers who may face deteriorating conditions, homelessness or living with an unwanted person and leaving their mothers to avoid the street. This conflicts with children’s and human rights. It asked whether housing-maintenance awards would reflect these consequences or remain so low they scarcely cover a day’s rent.
Aya Hamdy, lawyer and director of the foundation’s support offices, told Zawia3 the April 12 ruling entrenches conditions previously avoided in some courts. Different circuits had either extended residence when children over 15 chose their mother or returned the home at the end of custody, according to judicial discretion, lack of alternative shelter or daughters’ needs. The judgment now creates a fixed rule, removing exceptions even where remaining would serve children’s best interests.
In Loss of Virginity as a Condition for Justice? Legal Loopholes Remove the Rape Classification from Attacks on Children, Zawia3 examined weaknesses in Egypt’s 1937 Penal Code definitions of rape and indecent assault, reducing penalties and allowing perpetrators to avoid aggravated punishment. Under 2011 amendments, rape means non-consensual full vaginal intercourse with a female. Other acts—including anal penetration, hands or objects, forced oral sex, attacks on males or insertion of a finger or object into the vagina even if it ruptures the hymen—are classified as indecent assault. Egyptian law does not recognize marital rape.
Article 267 provides life imprisonment or death for rape where the victim is under 18, perpetrators are relatives, carers, educators or employees, or there are multiple attackers. Article 268 provides three to seven years’ rigorous imprisonment for indecent assault, potentially temporary hard labour where the victim is under 16 or aggravating circumstances exist, and life hard labour where both conditions coincide. Article 269 prescribes temporary hard labour or imprisonment depending on age and circumstances when no direct violence is used.
In Women in Egypt’s Prisons: Bodies without Rights, Zawia3 documented Sana Abdel Lah’s testimony—a pseudonym protecting her identity—about detention in 2019–2020. She described sexual assault by a female guard during intake, causing 15 days’ bleeding, severe back pain and exhaustion. Overcrowding forced women to sleep on one side without moving or resting comfortably.
Arrested four times between 2017 and 2020, Sana said her request for a gynaecologist was ignored for ten days. At the prison hospital, the specialist was absent and a general practitioner gave bleeding-control tablets without a real examination. Other prisoners told her the gynaecologist had harassed criminal-case prisoners who feared complaining, and said she was lucky he was away.
Toilet access was timed, showers almost prohibited or limited to minutes once a month, combing hair banned, and sleep restricted to midnight–6 a.m. regardless of health. Rights lawyer Hala Douma called for genuine implementation of Articles 19 and 20 of Prison Organization Law 396/1956 on mothers and pregnancy, and regulations recognizing sanitary pads as essential to prevent their use as a tool of abuse.
The National Council for Women and UN Women in Egypt, with the EU, launched the “Cheer Out Loud” campaign under the Ending Violence against Women programme to combat online abuse and bullying of female athletes. It encourages support through positive comments and opposition to online violence, helping create a safe digital environment.
Participants include Amani Khalil, the first Egyptian woman to complete six triathlon events after 50; fencer Nada Hafez; Paralympic badminton champion Shaimaa Samy; trampoline gymnast Malak Hamza; and young athletes in several sports.
Recommended reading: Marginalizing Women in Sport: A Lesson from the Paris Olympics
Environmental rights
In April, EIPR secured a judgment awarding EGP 200,000 to a Wadi El-Qamar resident harmed by Alexandria Portland Cement (Titan Cement). It was the fourth compensation ruling obtained for the initiative’s clients in the area.
The court found the company responsible for health damage arising from coal use in place of natural gas since 2015. Its coal-burning unit stands only ten metres from the residential area, violating environmental-law coal standards and requirements.
