20 Rights Groups Call on U.S. to Withhold $300mn Aid to Egypt
CAIRO (MEMO) – Human rights organizations are calling on U.S. officials to withhold $300 million of military aid to Egypt as the country has failed to meet the human rights conditions attached to the funding.
The money is part of $1.3 billion of FY2021 military funding for Egypt, of which $1 billion, which has no human rights conditions attached, has already been transferred.
The FY2021 law stipulates that $225 million should be withheld until Egypt takes “sustained and effective steps” on human rights conditions and the remaining $75 million should be withheld until the government makes progress releasing political prisoners and allowing them due process.
Addressing the letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs Jake Sullivan, the 20 organizations write that the Egyptian government has abjectly failed “to meet the congressionally mandated human rights conditions.”
“Providing this additional military aid to Egypt in these circumstances would contradict the frequent pledges from the Biden administration to put human rights at the center of U.S. foreign policy, including specifically its relationship with Egypt.”
The letter, whose signatories include the Freedom Initiative and Committee for Justice, goes on to say that President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s brutal repression has destabilized the country and committed a “staggering number of gross human rights violations,” among them torture, extrajudicial killings, and censorship.
Thousands remain in detention despite reform initiatives designed for global consumption, such as the National Strategy for Human Rights and the National Dialogue, in which Cairo promises to review violations, including the death penalty and torture.
‘Protest Against COP27 Greenwashing’
Meanwhile, demonstrators gathered outside the British embassy in Berlin on Monday to protest Egypt’s attempts to greenwash crimes with the COP27 conference.
The UN will host the COP27 climate change conference in Egypt’s Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh in November this year.
Several human rights organizations have slammed the decision for the conference to be held in Egypt where there has been a significant crackdown on civil society, protests are effectively banned and roughly 60,000 political prisoners remain behind bars.
Among these political prisoners are environmental activist Ahmed Amasha, who has been subject to forcible disappearance and torture, and a former professor in the department of environmental planning at Cairo University, Ahmed al-Kholy, who was arrested in 2019 and is still being held in pretrial detention on fabricated charges.
At the end of July, several environmentalists and activists questioned how Egypt could successfully host the COP27 summit due to its record on human rights abuses.
Egypt’s foreign minister has promised to set up a facility adjacent to the summit for people to protest but this has done little to allay sharp criticism.