The Human Rights Blog

ACIJLP has been following the stages of issuing Egypt's Judiciary Authority Law amendments. This law is especially important because it organizes the work of judges who are in charge of taking the final decision concerning the lives, freedoms, rights, duties and property of citizens. As a result, there is a need for the Judiciary Authority to have complete power over all issue of a judiciary nature. The Judiciary Authority is also solely responsible for settling all matters related to its members, following the remarks of legal jurisprudents and judges. Consequently, the Arab Center for the Independence of the Judiciary and the Legal Profession (ACIJLP) expresses its comments on the Draft Judiciary Authority Law presented to Egypt's parliament at this time.

Copenhagen-Geneva-Paris, April 30, 2009. The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, a joint programme of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT), and the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network (EMHRN) express their deep concern about the warning letter received by the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights (EOHR) from the Egyptian Ministry of Social Solidarity, which seriously undermines freedom of association in Egypt.

On April 27, 2009, the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights (EOHR) received a letter from the Egyptian Ministry of Social Solidarity, Masr-El-Kadima district authority, in which it was warned that the organisation risks to be subjected to closure and dissolution for violating Law of Association No. 84 of 2002. More specifically, the Ministry, which is the competent executive authority for all non-governmental organisations, indicated that Article 42 of the NGO Laws had been breached by EOHR, which, allegedly, had received unauthorised foreign funding.

Yesterday I sent a press release about the threatened closure of the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights. I did not do my due diligence to find out if the situation had changed until after I sent the story - for which I apologize. Here is the statement by the EOHR on the response by the Ministry of Social Solidarity, which is backing down from its previous threat.