Ibrahim Ezz El-Din

Personal Information

Name: Ibrahim Ezz El-Din

Date of birth: 15/11/1992

Nationality: Egyptian

Academic qualifications: 1- Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Department of Urban Planning, Al-Azhar University, Cairo.

Health condition: (Extremely critical) He suffers from asthma (a chronic illness), digestive problems and back pain.

Incidents of Violation

Ibrahim Ezz El-Din is a human rights defender and urban researcher at the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms, and a master's researcher at the Faculty of Engineering of Al-Azhar University. His work focuses on the right to adequate housing, the upgrading of informal settlements and resisting forced evictions. Egyptian security forces arrested him on 12 June 2019 and forcibly disappeared him for 167 days, until Ibrahim reappeared on 26 November 2019 before the State Security Prosecution in Cairo in connection with Case No. 488 of 2019 (State Security).

During his enforced disappearance, Ibrahim was subjected to physical torture and psychological intimidation. He was threatened with death and with electric shocks, deprived of food and sleep, beaten, and repeatedly threatened that harm would be done to his mother in order to pressure him into signing confessions to crimes he had not committed. During this period Ibrahim was allowed to sleep for one hour a day and to eat a single meal, which the guard would take away so quickly that, on the luckiest occasions, Ibrahim could eat no more than a quarter of it.

One day before Ibrahim reappeared, security officers cut his hair and shaved his beard so that the signs of his enforced disappearance would not be visible before the Prosecution. On 26 November 2019, Ibrahim appeared before the Prosecution wearing a tight shirt and baggy jeans, clothes that the security forces had ordered him to wear before taking him to the Prosecution. Ibrahim insisted that it be written in the investigation record that these clothes did not belong to him and were not the clothes he had been wearing at the time of his arrest. His request was refused, and the date of Ibrahim's arrest was recorded as 25 November 2019 rather than 12 June 2019. In this way, the State Security Prosecution disregarded Ibrahim's rights with regard to the crime of enforced disappearance to which he had been subjected.

The Prosecution charged him with joining a terrorist organisation with knowledge of its purposes, spreading false news and statements, and misusing social media platforms. After 13 months of arbitrary pretrial detention, the Criminal Court decided on 27 December 2019 to release Ibrahim under precautionary measures. Ibrahim was transferred to his local police station, but a few days later he was taken back to the State Security Prosecution to be questioned in a new case, No. 1018 of 2020, and the Prosecution ordered his detention for 15 days pending investigation.

Ibrahim Ezz El-Din's psychological and physical condition is now extremely critical. He has suffered repeated fainting spells during his detention without receiving any medical care, as he suffers from chronic asthma. Ibrahim's mother is also in an extremely critical condition: she suffered a nervous breakdown after hearing the news that Ibrahim had been "recycled" into a new case, after she had been waiting impatiently for his release.

Trials

• 1- ("Recycling") Held in arbitrary pretrial detention in connection with Case No. 1018 of 2020.
• 2- Released in connection with Case No. 488/2019, known in the media as the "Whistles" case.