Drop all charges against the four Coptic children, require the Egyptian Commission of Rights and Freedoms

Cairo, 3 February, 2016

ECRF demands that Egyptian authorities drop all charges against 4 Coptic children (Mueller Atef Edward, Amjad Hanna, Alber Ashraf Hanna, Clinton Majidi Yousif) whom had been accused of contempt of Islam by the prosecution of Bani Mazar in case No. 350 for the year 2015, Misdemeanors Bani Mazar, along with Coptic teacher Gad Yousif Younan, as both the students and their teacher were arrested in April 2015 after signs of sectarian backlash in their local neighborhood in Nassiriya village in Minya. The court released them pending the case on 10000 pound bail and postponed the trial to February 25, 2016. The teacher was tried and sentenced to three years in prison with 2000 fine in case No. 19794 of year 2015, Misdemeanors Bani Mazar, for insulting Islamic religion in a video he filmed to the four children.

Rumor had spread in their neighborhood that the teacher filmed the four children while they imitating Muslim prayer rites, which rose the tension among the people in the neighborhood. ECRF had watched the video and found that the four children are performing scenes where they are kneeling and imitating slaughter carried out by terrorist groups. The face of the teacher appeared at the end of the video, which shows that he was filming it. ECRF ensure that the teacher and the children had done is freedom of expression which is protected by Article 65 of the Egyptian constitution.
According to the lawyer, the defendants will be tried in two separate cases due to the age of the children, and chance of sentencing is very high as the teach already was sentenced for 3 year for the same incident. The lawyer pointed that the defendants were mocking the actions of the Islamic state, but the rumors around the video content had escalate the situation and put the children’s lives in danger. HE also ensured that the four children were detained for more than 45 days in places that aren’t dedicated to children detention violating Article No. 37 of CRC. and that they were subjected to ill-treatment. The court ignored the lawyer request to watch the video and only considered police investigations and technical report of the radio and television which was described as “biased” and doesn’t content the details of the incident.
ECRF confirms that this incident is not the first of its kind, as in October 2012 two children (Nabil Nady Rizk, 9 years and Mina Nady, 10 years) were arrested in Marko village in Bani Suif for three days for contempt of religion as someone claimed that they torn Koran. That reflect the seriousness of the role of societal pressures play in this kind of cases making some of the vague legislation threat against people with different opinions, writers, and minorities even children. Egyptian authorities and society instead of providing environment protects children and their right to express their opinion they arrest and try them.

ECRF warns of the return of using contempt of religion as accusations against writers and religious minorities. During the last quarter of 2015 and first month of 2016 there were three cases of contempt of religion against three Egyptian citizens. The first was against Islam El-Behry researcher in Islamic studies who was sentenced to one year in case No. 6931 of year 2015, Misdemeanors, Old Cairo, charged with infringement Muslim Imams and doubting the fundamentals of Islamic religion. Also the writer and journalist Fatma Naaot sentenced to 3 years with a LE 20000 fine for insulting rite of sacrifice in Islamic religion on her Facebook account, in addition to Gad Yousif Younan who was sentenced to three years.
ECRF emphasis on Egypt’s constitutional and international obligation to protect freedom of speech and expression and freedom of belief according to Article No. 64, 65 of the constitution and Article No. 18, 19 of the international Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. And also demand the Egyptian parliament to amend Article No. 98 of the penal Code and to revise all the legislations that contradict with the constitution and international laws regarding freedom of expression and speech rights and freedom of belief.