Lawyers for “Amar Desh” editor Mahmudur Rahman have released this statement below, claiming that the editor of the recently shut down Bangladeshi newspaper was tortured in police custody.
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On 13 June, Cairo security forces arrested 32 demonstrators, angry at alleged police involvement in the death of activist Khaled Mohammed Said. Clashes broke out outside the Egyptian Interior Ministry, where around 200 protestors gathered to argue that Said, who was outspoken about police corruption, had been tortured to death by undercover officers. Human Rights Organisations, including Amnesty International, have expressed concern at Said’s death. However the police deny any involvement, claiming that he died of a drug overdose, consumed prior to their arrival.
The editor of the Banjul-based The Independent newspaper, Musa Saidykhan, has informed judges that the people who tortured him in a 2006 incident were members of President Yahya Jammeh’s security forces. On 3 June a community court heard that the editor was arrested by policeman then tortured by presidential security forces, rendering him unconscious for 30 minutes. Siadykhan had recently returned from a human rights forum in South Africa where he gave an interview detailing the killing of 44 Ghanaian nationals in 2005. The Media Foundation for West Africa (MWA) instituted the legal action on behalf of Saidykhan.
A journalist working for a newspaper owned by the Islamist opposition politician, Hassan al-Turabi, has been charged with terrorism, espionage and destabilizing the constitutional system following his arrest on 15 May.
Al-Turabi and a further three journalists have yet to be charged with any specific crime by the authorities.