Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights
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The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights or EIPR ( ar, المبادرة المصرية للحقوق الشخصية) is an independent
Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...
ian human rights organization, established in 2002. It is a
Cairo Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the Capital city, capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, List of ...
-based
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.


Structure and leadership

, Gasser Abdel Razek was EIPR's Executive Director, Karim Ennarah was EIPR's Director of Criminal Justice and Mohammed Basheer was office manager.


Creation and aims

The EIPR was created in 2002 by Hossam Bahgat. EIPR aims to complement the work of other Egyptian human rights groups by focusing on human rights related to a person's "body, privacy and house".


Methods

The EIPR uses "research, documentation, legal aid, strategic litigation and advocacy" on issues including prison conditions during the
COVID-19 pandemic in Egypt The COVID-19 pandemic in Egypt is part of the worldwide pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 () caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (). The virus was confirmed to have reached Egypt on 14 February 2020. Background On 1 ...
,
capital punishment in Egypt Capital punishment is a legal penalty in Egypt. The state carried out at least 44 executions in 2016, at least 35 in 2017, and at least 43 in 2018. On 8 September 2020, a court in Egypt sentenced 75 people to death and 47 others to life imprisonmen ...
, attacks against
LGBT rights in Egypt Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Egypt face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBT residents. According to 2013 survey by the Pew Research Center, 95% of Egyptians believe that homosexuality should not be accepte ...
, and "foreign debt and sectarian violence".


Programs

, EIPR worked on four main programs, covering "criminal justice; civil liberties; economic and social justice; and regional and international human rights mechanisms".


The North African Litigation Initiative

EIPR established its North African Litigation Initiative (NALI) in 2010 to encourage NGOs and human rights defenders from North Africa to play a more active role within the African human rights system. The aim of NALI is to pressure North African governments to promote and protect the rights defined in the African Charter. NALI provides technical and financial assistance to North African NGOs and human rights defenders who wish to litigate using the African human rights system, especially the
African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights The African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights (ACHPR) is a quasi-judicial body tasked with promoting and protecting human rights and collective (peoples') rights throughout the African continent as well as interpreting the African Chart ...
.


Arrests of employees


November 2020

On 15 November 2020, the home of EIPR office manager Mohammed Basheer in Cairo was raided and he was detained by Egyptian security forces. Gasser Abdel Razek, EIPR's Executive Director, interpreted the raid and detention as a response to European diplomats meeting with EIPR staff at the EIPR headquarters earlier in November. Razek stated, "The extreme sensitivity displayed in dealing with the visit is the bigger confession of how bad the human rights situation is in Egypt. ... We are dealing with new kinds of rights violations which were not present five or 10 years ago." EIPR Director of Criminal Justice, Karim Ennarah, was detained on 18 November in Dahab. Executive director Gasser Abdel Razek was detained on 19 November at his home in Cairo. On 27 November 2020, the UN human rights experts called upon the Egyptian authorities to “immediately and unconditionally” release the three detained EIPR employees.


December 2020

On 3 December 2020, Abdel Razek, Ennarah, and Basheer, who were detained at Cairo's
Tora Prison Tora Prison ( arz, سجن طره '; ) is an Egyptian prison complex for criminal and political detainees, located in Tora, Egypt. The complex is situated in front of the Tora El Balad metro station. The main buildings in the Tora Prison complex a ...
, were released on bail after an international outcry from prominent Western politicians and actors including
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, and
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. On December 7th, however, a court extended the detention of Patrick Zaki, a researcher for EIPR who is also a student at an Italian university. On 18 December 2020, the
European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...
passed a resolution, citing what it perceived to be a deteriorating
human rights Human rights are moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of hu ...
situation in
Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...
. Approved with 434 votes, the resolution urged the member states to impose targeted restrictions against Egypt, particularly regarding its detention of the EIPR employees. However, the Egyptian Senate and
House of Representatives House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entitles. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often c ...
condemned the resolution, describing it as being politically motivated.


See also

*
Human rights in Egypt Human rights in Egypt are guaranteed by the Constitution of the Arab Republic of Egypt under the various articles of Chapter 3. The country is also a party to numerous international human rights treaties, including the International Covenant on ...


References


Further reading

*


External links

* {{Authority control Human rights organisations based in Egypt LGBT rights in Egypt 2002 establishments in Egypt Think tanks based in Egypt Organizations established in 2002