Since the beginning of 2016, Alkarama has been documenting more and more cases of enforced disappearances in Egypt to the United Nations Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID), including five new cases highlighted below. Omar Mohammed Ali Hamad and Mahmoud Ibrahim Mostafa Attia, have been missing since Rabaa Al Adawiya's massacre on 14 August 2013. The three other victims, Abderrahmane Elsayed Mahmoud Hassan, Basem Ahmed Shafik Ahmed and Islam Eid Zaky Karkoura disappeared respectively on 18 August 2015, 20 and 25 February 2016.

Credit photo: Daily News Egypt The transfer of two Red Sea islands, Tiran and Sanafir, to Saudi Arabia has been the subject of considerable criticism in Egypt. On 15 April 2015, few days after the announcement of this deal between the two countries, Egyptians peacefully gathered to protest against it. Although people initially took to the streets to express their discontent over the planned handover, many slogans were directed against the increasingly authoritarian drift of the regime and the state security apparatus. Similar peaceful protests were held on 25 April 2016 across the country.

On 24 January 2016, the Ministry of Interior declared having executed 32-year-old Mohamed Hamdan Mohamed Ali during a police operation in Beni Suef – a city located on the Nile’s shores, South of Cairo. The victim had however been arrested at work on 10 January 2016 and was missing since. Additionally, when his relatives were authorised to see his corpse, it bore evident marks of torture which made them believe that the authorities tried to cover-up the real circumstances of his death. Their claim was asserted by the authorities’ refusal to share the autopsy records and that no effective investigation was launched into his death to date. Hence, Alkarama solicited the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture (UNSRT) to ask the Egyptian authorities to take effective measure to shed light on his death.

Yasser Essawy (right) before Cairo Criminal Court In late March 2016, Yasser Essawy Ahmed Essawy, a sales representative detained since his arrest in October 2013, was urgently hospitalised to receive surgery in a Cairo hospital. Disregarding the doctor’s recommendation, the prison personnel refused the continuation of his hospitalisation after his surgery and sent him back to prison before he had time to properly recover. Even though he was put in the medical section of Tora prison, Yasser Essawy, 41 years old, has been continuously refused medical care since. Hence, his family reports that his state continues to decline, putting his life at risk. As a consequence, Alkarama solicited the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to health (UNSRH) to ask the Egyptian authorities to guarantee that Yasser Essawy is granted appropriate medical care and hospitalised again, if need be.