24 November 2015

Egypt: Enforced Disappearance of Former Air Force Pilot and Founder of Opposition Party

Hany Mohamed Hassanin Sharaf Hany Mohamed Hassanin Sharaf

On 24 November 2015, Alkarama sent an urgent appeal to the United Nations Working Group on Enforced of Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID) regarding the arrest by the Homeland Security of 45-year-old former Egyptian Air Force pilot Hany Mohamed Hassanin Sharaf on 18 November 2015. Disappeared since, his family believes that his arrest was triggered by his intention of creating an opposition political party, the Civilized Alternative Party and fears that he could be tortured while in secret detention in retaliation for his political affiliations.

Previous arrest

Retired from the Air Force, Hany took an active role in the January 2011 revolution that ousted Hosni Mubarak and was detained for more than a year in a military facility because of his activism. Following his release, and after the military coup that deposed Mohamed Morsi in July 2013, he decided with several other individuals to create an opposition political party named the Civilized Alternative Party.

Arrest and disappearance

The party gained popularity on social media, but was not totally established when Hany was arrested a second time on 18 November 2015. In fact, Hany was arrested on his way to Astrakhan − a city in southern European Russia, where his daughter studies medicine − at Cairo International Airport. His family lost contact with him soon after he stepped in the passenger terminal and he never arrived to Russia. Witnesses later told Hany's relatives that he had been arrested by the Homeland Security before getting on the plane.

On 21 November 2015, particularly worried over his fate, his family and some members of the Civilized Alternative Party sent telegrams to the General Prosecutor of Egypt and to the head of the Military Judiciary, but to no avail. Meanwhile, a member of the party was told that Hany was probably detained in a military facility in Nasr City, in the outskirts of Cairo, but in the face of the authorities' continuous denial, he hasn't been able to confirm the information to date.

To his family, it is the former pilot's political affiliations that have triggered his arrest by the Homeland Security − a security force that has conducted numerous arrests of political opponents in the past months, including against former parliamentarian Mahmoud Tawfik Abdalaal, disappeared since his arrest in June 2015. This intelligence agency is also notorious for torturing individuals secretly detained, particularly to force them to confess to crimes they did not commit such as in the case of journalist Hassan Mahmoud Ragab El Kabany who was charged with crimes as grotesque as "spying on behalf of foreign entities and spreading false information" and "participating in a criminal conspiracy to commit crimes to destabilise the State and the Constitution" on the sole basis of confessions obtained under torture. Hence, Hany's relatives fear that his secret detention could lead him to be ill-treated if not tortured.

"Enforced disappearance is a particularly gross violation of international human rights law because it often encompasses other violations such as torture and ill-treatment," said Rachid Mesli, Alkarama's Legal Director. "While Alkarama documented numerous cases of enforced disappearances, the UN WGEID itself voiced its concern over its systematisation and it is high time that the international community as a whole takes action to end this terrible practice in Egypt."

Alkarama's action

In view of the facts and the impossibility for the family to obtain recourse at the national level, Alkarama sent an urgent appeal to the UN Working Group on Enforced of Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID) to ask the Egyptian authorities to immediately disclose Hany Mohamed Hassanin Sharaf's place of detention and to authorise his family and lawyer to visit him. The Egyptian authorities should guarantee that every citizen freely exercises its rights to freedom of expression and of association without fear of being arrested and/or intimidated in reprisal.

For more information or an interview, please contact the media team at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. (Dir: +41 22 734 1008)

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