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« The Iraqi “resistance" | Main | Hamas and Fatah in the dock in Gaza drama »
Friday
Aug172007

Video shows child victim of torture in Egypt

The video below, updated to Google Video by Ikhwanweb.com, a Muslim Brotherhood website, shows an interview with a child and his mother, who say he was tortured in a police station in Mansoura, northern Egypt. The video is graphic and shows the child's burn wounds and other injuries. As horrible as these scenes are, it is videos like these (and the internet technologies to deliver them) that are lifting the veil on the type of police brutality that is apparently routine in Egypt.



Again, proceed with caution due to the graphic nature of the footage.







Update: I didn't realize it at the time of my earlier post, but the boy in the video has died from his wounds. (I had read about the scandal last week, but did not put two and two together.) From what I gathered from various online sources, the boy was quickly buried by the police before a proper autopsy could be carried out. Human rights activists called for his body to be exhumed and a new autopsy carried out, and Mansoura police to be charged:




Egypt to exhume boy's body



Cairo - Egypt's chief prosecutor has ordered the exhumation of the body of a teenager who died in police custody amid family allegations he was tortured to death, said reports.



A new autopsy would be carried out on 13-year-old Mamduh Abdel Aziz, who died in hospital in the Nile Delta town of Mansura on Sunday, four days after police took him there because he lost consciousness while in their custody on a theft charge.



His family immediately filed a complaint against police, claiming they tortured him to death.



The police report said he died of a lung complaint, and the interior ministry denied any torture, saying that burns on his body were accidental.



However, a legal source said on Sunday that the boy had lost consciousness during his six days in police detention, apparently after being beaten.







Related: Egyptian cops find torture kit. What a country.

Reader Comments (1)

May Allah swt punish those who had done this to the boy. Even if he makes mistake but he didnt deserves to be beaten and died this way. It is haram and he is still a child. Poverty has make people do anything to live and I dont blame him if he did something illegal coz the Government is not helping him or his mother to live!!

Mubarak and his Government are to blame for all this sufferings. I hope all the Egyptian will open their eyes and fight for their rights to live and survives!

Aug 18, 2007 at 1:26 AM | Unregistered Commenterlulu

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