Report: Egypt threatens Amal Clooney with arrest over damning report on judiciary
The possible threat of arrest against Clooney was first reported by the British newspaper The Guardian.
Egyptian authorities have threatened prominent human rights
lawyer Amal Clooney with arrest for exposing flaws in the criminal justice
system following the detention and imprisonment of three Al Jazeera
journalists.
Clooney, the British attorney of Lebanese extraction,
represents one of the three Al Jazeera journalists currently jailed in Egypt.
The possible threat of arrest against Clooney was first
reported on Friday by the British newspaper The Guardian.
Clooney told The Guardian that she had written a report
commissioned by the International Bar Association which recommended that the
Egyptian government undertake reforms to make the judiciary more independent.
The report cited the undue influence that Egyptian
politicians have over the court system and state prosecutors, which Clooney
says contributed to the trial and imprisonment of the three journalists.
Two of the three Al Jazeera journalists have applied to be
deported under a new law after the country's highest court ordered their
retrial but did not free them as their families had hoped.
Australian Peter Greste, Canadian-Egyptian Mohamed Fahmy,
who is represented by Clooney, and Egyptian Baher Mohamed were sentenced in
June to seven to 10 years in jail for spreading lies to help a "terrorist
organization" - a reference to Egypt's outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.
Egypt's High Court ordered their retrial on Thursday citing
procedural flaws in the original trial, which was condemned by human rights
groups and Western governments.
The reporters' imprisonment is a thorny issue for Egyptian
President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi as he seeks to prove his commitment to reform,
having ousted his Islamist predecessor in July 2013 and cracked down on the
Brotherhood.
Their families say they are paying the price for a
deterioration in ties between Qatar, which owns Al Jazeera, and Egypt following
the Brotherhood's expulsion from power.
Doha supported the Brotherhood during its year in power but
a recent Saudi push to heal the rift had raised expectations the reporters
would be freed.
The new law passed in November allows for foreign convicts
or suspects to be transferred to their country to serve their sentences or to
be tried there. It was not clear how it might be applied in the Al Jazeera case
since there are no precedents.
Greste's lawyer Mostafa Nagy told Reuters in Cairo he had
presented the prosecution with a deportation request last month but received no
response. He planned to make a new request in light of Thursday's ruling and
hoped it would be accepted.
Greste's brother, Andrew, echoed those hopes.
"Now that Peter is essentially an innocent man, he's
not convicted any more, it does allow for some room to move and for him (Sisi)
to step in ... and deport him," he told reporters in Brisbane.
Fahmy's brother Adel told Reuters in Cairo: "Our lawyer
Amal Clooney has submitted a request for deportation to the public prosecutor
and the presidency which has been endorsed by the Canadian government and we
believe this is the best option."
Despite widespread criticism of the case, Sisi has resisted
intervening directly, citing judicial independence.
Defense lawyers say the retrial could begin within a month.
The judge has the power to release all three on bail at the first hearing
though a verdict could take months. Adel Fahmy said that made deportation a
more attractive route.
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