Friday 23 February 2007

Free Kareem Amer

This has been widely blogged about elsewhere (see here for starters) but just in case you missed it, a blogger and law student in Egypt has been sentenced to four years in prison for insulting Islam and criticising President Mubarak. Details of the case can be found on Amnesty International's campaign page here.

Kareem's own blog is here - it's in Arabic, but his profile is in English and speaks volumes I think:

"I am down to earth Law student; I look forward to help humanity against all form of discriminations. I am currently studying Law in Al Azhar University. I am looking forward to open up my own human rights activists Law firm, which will include other lawyers who share the same views. Our main goal is to defend the rights of Muslim and Arabic women against all form of discrimination and to stop violent crimes committed on a daily basis in these countries ."

Please be grateful for our own freedom to be as offensive, subversive or just plain idiotic as we like. And if you feel so inclined, please make your feelings known to:

The Egyptian Ambassador to the UK; His Excellency Mr Gehad Refaat Madi: email
The Egyptian Government: email
UK Foreign Office, Dr Kim Howells: email

Please make any emails polite, non-confrontational and respectful - otherwise you risk damaging the cause.

This also gives me the excuse to draw your attention to the irrespressible.info button at the bottom of this page - please follow the link, put the button on your own page, and help keep expression free across the world.

Thanks for your attention, please pass the info on.

Ally
x

2 comments:

Zinnia Cyclamen said...

Good call. Have been and signed the petition, and will put the button on my blog when I next update my sidebar (this week probably - will link you, also).

Anonymous said...

People should read this.