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Home » Egypt » Press Releases » EGY - News » Egypt: The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention finds the detention of former Egyptian president Morsi arbitrary and requests his immediate release
Mr Morsi and his advisors have been arrested and detained without being granted due process guarantees since the military takeover on 3 July 2013. To justify this unlawful arrest a legal procedure was started against him and he has been charged with conspiring with foreign groups to commit terrorist acts.
In its sixty-eight session the UN body delivered its opinion on the nature of the detention of Morsi and his advisers making a finding of arbitrary detention because "they were not given any legal basis to justify their detention; were not justified of the charges against them; had not been brought before a judge; were placed under house arrest at the premises of the army and under high security; and, were unable to communicate with their families or lawyers."
The Working Group on arbitrary detention called on the Egyptian Government to immediately release Dr Morsi and his advisors.
This decision by the Working Group should send a strong message to the Egyptian authorities to cease its campaign of arbitrary detention that has targeted the new authorities' opponents throughout Egypt's political spectrum, be they Islamists or liberal.
The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, noting the widespread campaign of arbitrary arrests in Egypt by regretted that "the Government of Egypt, that is facing a serious crisis which has, in part, its basis and origins in similar violations of human rights, has not thought it necessary to respond to such allegations, especially regarding the President of the Republic and his advisors."