Alaa Abdel Fattah, figure of the 2011 revolt, sentenced to five years in prison

Alaa Abdel Fattah, central figure in the 2011 uprising in Egypt and in pre-trial detention, was sentenced to five years in prison by an exceptional Cairo court for “spreading false information”, as his sister announced on Monday December 20. Two other activists were sentenced to four years in prison on the same charges: Mohamed al-Baqer, Alaa Abdel Fattah’s former lawyer, and blogger Mohamed Ibrahim, alias Oxygen.

Nicknamed “the icon of the revolution” of 2011 which ousted President Hosni Mubarak from power, Alaa Abdel Fattah has already been the subject of several convictions. He was imprisoned under the autocrat Hosni Mubarak, his Islamist successor Mohamed Morsi (2012-2013) and the current head of state Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. He had been in pre-trial detention for more than two years and has spent a total of seven years in prison since 2013.

Alaa Abdel Fattah, political activist and computer programmer, was arrested in 2013 after an unauthorized demonstration. He was accused of organizing an “illegal demonstration”, “provoking a riot” and “hitting a police officer and stealing his radio transmitter”. However, he continued to speak on social networks defending the rights of other former prisoners, forced to spend their nights behind bars after their release from prison. Released under judicial supervision in March 2019, Alaa Abdel Fattah was arrested with his lawyer Me Baqer in September of the same year.

Since coming to power, following the dismissal of Mohamed Morsi in the summer of 2013, President Sisi has been accused by international human rights NGOs of carrying out an all-out crackdown on opponents and human rights defenders. ‘Man. According to them, Egypt has more than 60,000 prisoners of conscience. The government denies and emphasizes maintaining stability in the country.