President Sisi who is fighting the jihadists and protecting Coptic churches should immediately order the release of Yemeni Christian convert.
August 26, 2024
The American Mideast Coalition for Democracy abhors human rights violations of all kinds, but imprisonment for “thought-crimes” is especially egregious; therefore, AMCD calls for the release of Abdulbaqi Saeed Abdo, whose “crime” was joining a Christian facebook group while living in Egypt. He has been held for two years and eight months in pre-trial detention and plans to increase his strike in stages, beginning with refusing healthcare and eventually to include refusing food.
“When will Islamic Groups realize they can no longer control the religious thoughts of their people?” asked AMCD co-chair Tom Harb. “The spiritual longing of a people cannot be contained or suppressed, and eventually Muslims will be drawn to the higher and more profound religions of the world.”
“The alarming practice of throwing people in prison for facebook posts is spreading to the Western world,” added AMCD co-chair John Hajjar. “It was thought that with increased cultural communication and exchange, the best traditions of the West (freedom and democracy) would be adopted in the Near East, but instead, the worst practices of the Near East are spreading into the West. Very few people would have predicted that thirty years ago.”
“The imprisonment of Yemeni refugee Abdulbaqi Saeed Abdo at the hands of Egyptian authorities is a surreal example of censorial blasphemy policies in action. It’s also illegal. Egyptian officials have violated this father and husband’s human rights and must release him back to his family immediately,” said Ayyan Hirsi Ali, research fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution and founder of the AHA Foundation.
“The world should take note of what the Egyptian government does,” she added. “This is the logical conclusion to a trend that empowers authorities to brutalize innocent people for free expression on social media. From China to Pakistan, from Russia to Syria, from the UK to Egypt—free speech must urgently be defended from our age’s resurgent Stalinism.”
AMCD stands firmly with prisoner of conscience Mr. Abdo against the forces of tyranny, and calls for his immediate release by General Sisi, who came to power by ousting the Muslim Brotherhood and has been continually fighting their bid for power ever since. Apostacy and blasphemy laws should have no place in the modern world.