By Mohammad Baali
Albawaba.com – Cairo
The trial of 52 Egyptian men accused of having gay sex will be resumed in Cairo on Thursday, when the prosecutor general will complete his arguments and the court will hear more testimony.
Khaled Ali, a defense lawyer from the human rights-oriented Hisham Mubarak Law Center, told Albawaba.com that his co-workers would submit a memo to the court challenging the constitutionality of the procedures used to arrest the defendants.
He said the challenge would also address the police investigation of events, which was reportedly carried out by a single officer in only 15 days, despite the large number of suspects hailing from eight districts.
Ali added that the center’s lawyers had already submitted an appeal to the administrative court challenging the president’s decision to refer the case to the state security court.
Should the authorities agree with the contents of the challenge, “the proceeding of this and other similar cases referred to the security court will be stopped,” added Ali.
Human rights activists in Egypt and abroad have criticized the trial, saying that it was mounted by the government to distract the public from serious economic hardships.
The Egyptian authorities arrested the suspects last May and accused them of immoral behavior. Two of them were also accused of contempt for religion.
The London- based human rights watchdog, Amnesty International, has said it was “gravely concerned about the ongoing detention” of the young Egyptians, described by the authorities as homosexuals.
According to Hossam Baghat, the international relations coordinator for the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights, the men are at risk of “losing their jobs, families, friends and social status, as well as spending up to five years in prison.”
“The case involves religious beliefs and morality, two elements that have always succeeded in keeping people engaged for a long time,” said a lawyer from a center defending four of the accused, quoted by Baghat in his article Explaining Egypt’s Targeting of Gays.
"The majority, if not all, of these men are detained purely on the grounds of their alleged sexual orientation," according to Amnesty’s statement.
"If people are detained solely on account of their sexual orientation, Amnesty International would consider them prisoners of conscience and call for their immediate and unconditional release," the statement added.
The organization said that it was also extremely concerned about allegations that the detainees were tortured or ill-treated during the first days of their detention.
“These serious allegations should be promptly investigated by the Egyptian authorities,” the statement said.
According to Amnesty, the vilification and persecution of people for their sexuality violate the most fundamental principles of international human rights law.
The right to freedom from discrimination on the basis of sex, which includes sexual orientation, is recognized in regional and international treaties, including the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Egypt is a state party, it said.
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